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THE     DIVINE    ORIGIN 


OF 


CHRISTIANITY 


INDICATED  BY  ITS  HISTORICAL  EFFECTS 


BV 


RICHARD    S.    STORRS,    D.D.,  LL.D 


NEW  YORK 
ANSON    D.    F.    RANDOLPH    &   COMPANY 

38  WEST  TWENTY-THIRD  STREET. 


copyright,  1884,  by 
Aotow  D.  F.  Randolph  &  Company. 


NEW  YORK: 

EnwARD  o.  Jenkins'  sons,  Robert  ritttkr. 

Printers  and  Stereotypes,  Binder, 

ao  North  William  St.  "6  and  118  East  14th  Street 


TEN  LECTURES 

DELIVERED  BEFORE 

THE   UNION   THEOLOGICAL   SEMINARY,  NEW  YORK, 

THE   LOWELL   INSTITUTE,   BOSTON. 
WITH    NOTES    AND    AN    INDEX. 


371544 


TO    THE    MEMORY 

OF 

WILLIAM   ADAMS,    D.D.,  LL.D. 

HONORED    AND    BELOVED, 

FOH   HIS  ADMIRABLE  POWERS,   FOR  HIS  MANY  ACCOMPLISHMENTS,   FOR  HIS 

LARGE  USEFULNESS,    FOR  THE  WISDOM  OF  HIS  COUNSELS,    THE  GRACE 

OF  HIS  ENGAGING  COURTESY,    THE   UNFAILING   FIDELITY  OP 

HIS  FRIENDSHIP: 

• 

MOST   OF   ALL 

FOR  THE  BEAUTY  AND  STRENGTH  OF  HIS  CHRISTIAN  FAITH 


THESE    LECTUEES, 


PREPARED  AT  HIS  URGENT  INVITATION,    AND  AFTERWARD  REWARDED 
BY  HIS  APPROVAL. 


ARE  AFFECTIONATELY  INSCRIBED. 


CON  TENTS 


LECTURE  I. 
External  evidence  for  Christianity  as  Divine:  the  value  and  limitations 
of  its  probative  force ;  3-32 ;  notes,  361-380. 

LECTURE   II. 

The  new  conception  of  Gk)d,  introduced  by  Christianity;  35-63;  notes, 
381-408. 

LECTURE  III. 

The  new  conception  of  Man,  introduced  by  Chiistianity ;  67-99 ;  notes, 
409-433. 

LECTURE   IV. 

The  new  conception  of  the  duty  of  Man  toward  God,  in  worship ;  103- 
132;  notes,  434-458. 

LECTURE   V. 

Tlie  new  conception  of  Man's  duty  to  Man,  in  politics  and  society; 
135-169;  notes,  459^97. 

LECTURE  VI. 

The  new  conception  of  the  duties  of  Nations,  toward  each  other;  173- 
208;  notes,  498-526. 

LECTURE   Vn. 

Tlie  effect  of  Christianity  on  the  Mental  culture  of  mankind ;  211-245 ; 
notes,  527-566. 

(V) 


vi  CONTENT,^.  . 

LECTURE   VIII. 

The  effect  of  Christianity  on  the  Moral  life  of  mankind;  249-282 
notes,  567-597. 

LECTURE   IX. 

The  effect  of  Christianity  on  the  world's  hope  of  prog^ress;  285-316 
notes,  598-624. 

LECTURE   X. 

A  review  of  the  argument,  with  added  suggestions ;  319-357 ;  notea^ 
625-639. 

Index,  641. 


AUTHOR'S    NOTE 


The  following  Lectures  were  prepared  to  be  delivered  before 
the  students  of  the  Union  Theological  Seminary  in  Xew  York, 
on  what  is  there  known  as  "  The  Ely  Foundation,"  *  and  also 
before  the  Lowell  Institute  in  Boston.  They  were  subsequently, 
by  request,  delivered  in  Brooklyn. 

The  publication  of  them  has  been  delayed,  partly  by  the  neces- 
sity of  using  occasional  and  infrequent  intervals  of  time  for  col- 
lating and  transcribing  the  passages  from  various  authors  whoso 
respective  statements  of  fact  or  opinion  will  be  found  in  the  Ap- 
pendix, and  partly  by  the  wish  to  get  sufficient  leisure  for  revis- 
ing the  Lectures,  for  considering  critically  the  argument  which 
they  present,  after  the  mind  should  have  ceased  to  be  affected  by 
any  lingering  influence  from  the  impulse  of  rapid  writing,  for 
limiting  whatever  might  appear  on  such  review  excessive  in 
statement,  and  for  reinforcing  whatever  a  maturer  thought 
might  regard  as  imperfect  in  conception  or  inadequate  in  ex- 
pression. Circumstances  have  hardly  permitted  the  writer,  to 
the  full  measure  of  his  desire,  to  accompKsh  this  purpose.  Sen 
tences  have  occasionally  been  changed  in  form.  A  number  of 
paragraphs  are  retained  on  the  printed  page,  which  had  been  ex- 


*  Established  by  Mr.  Z.  Stiles  Ely,  of  New  York,  A.D.  1865;  the  title 
of  the  Lectureship  being  "  The  Ehas  P.  Ely  Lectures,  on  the  Evidencea 
of  Christianity." 


viii  AUTHORS  NOTE. 

eluded  in  speaking  by  lack  ol  time.  In  a  few  instances,  tha 
argument,  where  it  seemed  needful,  lias  been  sligbtly  expanded, 
or  differently  illustrated.  But  in  all  important  respects  the  Lec- 
tures appear  in  the  volume  as  tbey  Avere  when  delivered. 

A  good  many  notes  and  references  liave  here  been  added  to 
them,  as  will  be  observed  :  in  the  hope  that  these  may  illustrate, 
sustain,  or  if  needful  correct,  related  statements  in  the  text.  In 
arranging  these  Notes  the  compiler  of  them  has  had  no  thought 
of  seeking  to  instruct  studious  scholars,  to  whom,  on  the  other 
hand,  he  gladly  acknowledges  his  constant  indebtedness,  and  to 
whom  he  is  quite  aware  that  many  of  the  JN^otes  will  seem 
whoUy  superfluous.  But  knowing  that  some  of  those  whom  it  ia 
hoped  that  the  Lectures  will  interest  may  not  have  ready  access 
to  some  of  the  books  important  to  be  consulted  in  connection 
with  the  subject,  he  has  thought  it  well  to  quote,  instead  of 
merely  referring  to,  such  passages  from  ancient  or  modem  au- 
thors, lying  within  his  reach,  as  have  seemed  to  have  the  most 
direct  bearing  upon  his  pruicipal  trains  of  thought.  The  many 
to  whom  these  passages  are  familiar,  or  who  might  easily  turn  to 
them  in  their  libraries,  wiU  understand,  he  doubts  not,  the  motive 
which  has  prompted  to  the  printing  of  them  here,  for  the  con- 
venience of  those  less  amply  equipped. 

Other  passages,  equally  pertinent,  have  been  excluded,  by  an 
unwiUingness  to  increase  unduly  the  size  of  the  volume.  In 
making  selection  of  those  to  be  printed,  while  laying  others  aside, 
the  lecturer  has  had,  of  course,  to  use  his  own  judgment  as  to 
what  would  probably  be  most  interesting  or  helpful  to  those 
reading  his  pages.  He  has  no  doubt  made  mistakes,  perhaps 
many,  in  applying  this  rule  ;  and  he  regrets  the  absence  of  pas- 
sages which  he  had  taken  pains  to  collect,  because  possessing  to 
his  mind  important  significance.  But  he  hopes  that,  in  the  main, 
affirmative  statements  made  in  the  Lectures  will  be  found  to  have 


AUTHOR'S  NOTE.  ix 

Biifficient  verification  in  the  IS"otes ;  and  that  the  roots  of  the  tree, 
even  as  here  presented,  will  not  be  deemed  altogether  unequal  to 
the  trunk  and  branches  which  thej  ought  to  sustain. 

When  the  passages  cited  have  been  taken  from  classical  or  for- 
eign authors,  they  are  always  presented  in  an  English  translation, 
to  render  them  serviceable  to  those  unacquainted  with  other 
languages.  Where  this  translation  has  been  made  by  the  wri- 
ter, he  has  sought  to  secure  accuracy  in  it,  rather  than  ele« 
gance.  But  he  has  freely  used  translations  by  others,  where  these 
have  become  accredited  among  scholars,  and  where  no  reason  for 
changing  them  has  appeared.  Thus  the  quotations  from  Plato  ai-e 
made  in  Jowett's  version ;  those  from  Plutarch,  in  Goodwin's,  or 
Clough's ;  and  those  from  the  early  Christian  Fathers,  almost  uni- 
formly, in  the  translations  of  the  Ante-Nicene  Library.  Especially 
where  the  meaning  of  single  words  has  been  a  matter  of  special 
importance,  as  is  not  infrequently  the  case,  one  naturally  pre- 
fers to  have  his  own  judgment  thus  corrected  or  justified  by 
the  conclusions  of  others. 

In  not  a  few  instances,  as  will  be  noticed,  extracts  are  taken 
from  modern  authors  with  whose  general  lines  of  thought  the 
writer  of  the  Lectures  can  by  no  means  agree,  and  from  whose 
prevaihng  spirit  he  must  earnestly  dissent,  but  who  seem  to  him, 
upon  the  points  specifically  touched,  to  have  borne  a  witness 
to  the  truth  which  as  coming  from  them  has  perhaps  pecuHai 
value.  In  all  cases,  it  is  to  be  distinctly  understood  that  the  gen- 
eral sentiments  quoted,  from  whatever  author,  may  not  be  pre- 
cisely or  fully  expressive  of  the  opinions  of  the  lecturer.  They 
are  sometimes  purposely  taken  from  those  with  whom  he  differs, 
as  showing  how  other  minds  have  regarded  the  same  matters,  and 
as  repeating  the  thoughts  concerning  those  matters  which  they 
have  put  into  energetic  or  attractive  expression. 

To  enable  any  one  wishing  to  do  so  to  verify  the  references,  or 


at  AUTHOR'S  NOTE. 

to  read  tlie  cited  passages  in  their  original  context,  tlie  editi  )na 
which  have  been  used  are  carefully  mentioned ;  and  they  have 
been  the  most  recent  which  it  has  been  convenient  to  consult. 
Where  foreign  editions  and  American  reprints  have  been  equally 
accessible,  the  latter  have  been  used  in  maldng  the  citations,  the 
correctness  of  these  being  first  ascertained,  in  order  to  afford  all 
possible  facihties  to  any  wishing  to  examine  them  further.  It  is 
hoped  that  each  Note  will  be  found  connected,  with  sufficient 
clearness,  with  the  page  on  which  stands  the  corresponding  pas- 
sage in  the  text  of  the  Lectures ;  but  this  connection  is  only  indi- 
cated at  the  beginning  of  the  Kote  itself.  In  order  to  avoid  the 
frequent  and  troublesome  arrest  of  the  eye  in  traversing  the 
pages,  it  has  seemed  best,  to  both  publisher  and  author,  that  all 
numbers  or  signs  directing  attention  to  the  Appendix,  should  be 
omitted  from  the  body  of  the  volume.  The  comparatively  few 
foot-notes  which  are  retained  have  been  employed  to  mark  the 
location  of  passages  fully  quoted  in  the  text,  or  of  such  as  it  has 
fieemed  less  important  than  in  other  cases  to  print  at  large  in  the 
Appendix. 

One  who  has  suffered  many  times  from  the  necessity  of  review- 
ing large  parts  of  volumes  which  had  been  left  wholly  unindexed, 
in  order  to  find  a  passage  containing  an  important  statement  of 
fact  or  opinion,  the  authorship  of  which  was  known,  but  the  pre- 
cise place  of  which  could  not  be  recalled,  may  perhaps  be  par- 
doned if  he  has  sometimes  regretted  that  the  ancient  vigorous 
forms  of  anathema  against  sins  of  omission  are  not  now  in  custom- 
ary use.  But  he  would  certainly  lose  all  claim  to  forgiveness 
on  the  part  of  his  own  readers  if  he  had  failed  to  supply  to  them 
what  he  has  desired  and  missed  in  others.  A  very  minute  and 
elaborate  Index  was  prepared  for  this  volume,  with  the  utmost 
kindness  and  care,  by  Dr.  S.  Austin  Allibone,  of  the  Lenox  li- 
brary.   The  necessary  limitation  of  the  size  of  the  volume  pre^ 


AUTHOR'S  NOTE,  xi 

eluded,  however,  so  large  an  addition,  and  a  briefer  Index  has 
been  snbstitnted.  It  is  believed  that  this  will  still  afford,  to  those 
wishing  to  refer  to  any  passage  in  the  book,  or  to  any  author 
quoted  or  referred  to,  the  needful  assistance.  In  reading  the 
Lectures  and  the  I^otes,  for  the  purpose  of  preparing  an  Index, 
Dr.  AUibone  by  no  means  charged  himself  with  any  responsibil- 
ity lor  suggesting  typographical  corrections.  But  his  accurate 
and  trained  eye  detected  occasional  errors,  which  had  before 
parsed  unnoticed  ;  and  to  his  judgment  and  critical  taste,  in  such 
matters  as  in  others,  the  author  has  been  frequently  indebted. 

That  branch  of  the  External  Evidences  of  the  Divine  origin  of 
Christianity  which  is  considered  in  these  Lectures  is  often  inci- 
dentally referred  to,  but  it  hardly  seems  to  have  had  among  us 
the  comprehensive  and  particular  treatment  to  which  it  is  enti- 
tled. Professor  George  P.  Fisher  has  treated  a  part  of  it,  in  his 
Lectures  on  "  The  Beginnings  of  Christianity,"  and  he  has  done 
it  with  the  abundant  learning,  the  precision  and  elegance  cf  state- 
ment, and  the  admirable  candor,  which  he  brings  to  the  discus- 
sion of  every  subject.  But  large  parts  of  it  did  not  come  within 
the  range  of  his  replete  and  instructive  Lectures ;  and  of  these 
parts  it  is  equally  important  to  gain  a  distinct  and  just  impression. 

Ko  one  can  become  more  profoundly  aware,  after  reading  the 
present  Lectures,  than  the  author  of  them  already  is,  of  the  in- 
completeness of  his  own  discussion  of  so  great  a  subject — ^under 
the  sharp  limitations  of  time  restricting  the  Lectures  in  their  oral 
delivery,  under  the  more  imperious  limitations  imposed  by  mani- 
fold independent  occupations.  He  found,  however,  long  ago,  in 
the  trains  of  thought  here  suggested,  instruction  and  satisfaction 
for  his  own  mind,  an  argument  for  faith,  an  incitement  to  Chris- 
tian obedience  and  service.  In  preparing  the  Lectures,  therefore, 
he  was  not  seeking  to  construct  an  argument  for  a  foregone  con- 
clusion, but  simply  to  recall  and  present  to  others  an  argument 


Xii  AUTHORS  NOTE. 

the  propriety  of  which,  and  its  legitimate  force,  had  appeared  to 
him  evident  when  he  began  to  inquire  for  himseK,  without  refer- 
ence to  the  opinions  of  others,  into  the  claims  of  Christianity 
upon  him.  He  cannot  but  regret  his  inability  to  do  the  work, 
committed  to  him  by  the  partiahty  of  friends,  with  that  rare  and 
spacious  range  of  knowledge,  and  that  power  to  coordinate  all 
particulars  of  knowledge  in  complete  exhibition,  which  would 
better  have  matched  the  imperial  theme.  But  he  has  been 
glad  to  do  what  he  could,  for  the  elucidation  of  a  subject  so 
vast  in  both  its  compass  and  its  importance;  and  it  would  be 
to  him  a  great  joy  and  reward  if  the  processes  of  thought  in 
connection  with  which  he  reached  years  since  distinct  conclusions, 
which  remain  influential  for  his  own  miad,  might  bring  to  others 
a  similar  assurance,  with  an  animating  impulse  more  deep  and 
fruitful. 

He  gratefully  remembers  the  testimonies  which  came  to  him 
of  such  impressions  received  by  some  when  the  Lectures  were 
delivered.  He  would  fain  hope  that  others  who  may  hereafter 
consider  them,  on  the  pages  to  which  they  are  now  committed, 
will  find  their  confidence  awakened  or  renewed  in  the  Divine 
origin  and  the  superlative  authority  of  that  Religion  to  which 
Christendom  seems  to  the  writer,  beyond  doubt,  to  owe  whatever 
is  chiefest  in  its  inheritance  of  moral  wisdom  and  spiritual  life, 
and  from  which  the  conscious  human  soul,  in  the  future  as  in  the 
past,  must  derive,  as  he  conceives,  whatever  is  sure  and  uplifting 
in  its  knowledge  of  the  Unseen,  whatever  is  holiest  in  its  expe- 
rience, whatever  is  sweetest  and  most  transporting  in  aspiration 
and  in  hope. 

Of  course,  upon  any  one  denying  at  the  outset  the  essential 
possibility  of  a  supernatural  revelation  of  truth  to  man,  neither 
the  argument  here  presented,  nor  any  other  of  a  similar  nature, 
can  exert  particular  influence :  as  no  argument  can  convince  OJ 


AUTHORS  NOTE.  xlii 

that  philosophical  speculations  may  be  commimicated  to  dogs,  or 
that  parrots  can  be  taught  spiritually  to  interpret  the  tender  and 
majestic  secrets  of  the  symphonies  of  Beethoven.  To  one  admit- 
ting a  revelation  to  be  possible,  who  yet  has  in  his  mind  a  precon- 
ceived model  to  which,  in  method,  instrmnents,  and  proof,  such 
a  revelation  must  be  conformed,  but  with  which  Christianity  does 
not  correspond,  the  argument  of  these  Lectures,  or  any  other 
on  the  same  subject,  will  be  for  the  most  part  ineffective  :  as  it 
would  be  in  vain  to  try  to  show  the  ample  blessing  of  summer- 
ehowers  to  one  predetermined  to  find  no  quickening  virtue  for 
vegetation  except  in  ice-storms  or  in  cyclones.  But  to  one  who 
admits  it  possible,  at  least,  for  God  to  reveal  His  truth  and  will 
to  the  man  whom  He  has  made,  and  who  is  content  to  have  Him 
do  this,  if  at  all,  in  the  way  which  to  Him  appears  best  adapted 
to  His  benign  purpose — the  argument  which  is  outlined  in  these 
Lectures  seems  to  the  writer  one  of  important  persuasive  force. 
The  Lectures  were  certainly  not  suggested  by  the  emphatic  words 
of  Dr.  James  Martineau,  but  these  might  fitly  enough  stand  as 
their  motto : — "  The  thorough  interweaving  of  all  the  roots  of 
Christianity  with  the  history  of  the  world  on  which  it  has  sprung, 
is  at  once  a  source  of  its  power,  and  an  assurance  of  its  divine- 
ness."  * 

It  is  probably  hardly  necessary  to  add  that  these  Lectures  had 
been  fully  written  and  delivered  before  the  author  of  them  had  any 
knowledge  of  the  volume  since  published  by  Mr.  Charles  Loring 
Brace,  entitled  "  Gesta  Christi ;  or  a  History  of  Hiunane  Prog- 
ress under  Christianity."  A  part  of  the  subject  discussed  in  these 
Lectures — particularly  in  the  fifth  and  the  sixth  Lectures — is 
presented  in  that  volume  with  such  exemplary  clearness  and 
carefulness,  and  such  ample  command  of  the  necessary  learning, 


♦  Miscellanies;  Boston  ed.,  1852:  pp.  208-9. 


nv  AUTHOR'S  NOTE. 

that  the  present  writer  would  hardly  have  ventured  upon  an  ixt 
dependent  treatment  of  these  particular  themes  if  he  had  knowB 
beforehand  of  the  existence  of  the  volume,  and  of  its  expected 
publication.  He  cannot,  however,  refrain  from  expressing  the 
gratification  which  he  has  felt  in  finding  that  the  conclusions 
which  he  had  reached,  in  his  previous  occasional  studies  of  the 
subject,  are  in  close  accord  with  those  presented,  and  confirmed 
by  a  wider  range  of  references,  in  that  excellent  treatise :  which 
has  brought  fresh  honor  to  American  scholarship,  as  well  as  to 
the  mind  and  the  spirit  of  its  accomplished  and  dihgent  author. 

R.  S.  STORES. 
Bkooklyn,  N.  Y.,  Octoher  25, 1884. 


LECTUEE    I. 


EXTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY  AS  DIVINE 
THE  VALUE  AND  LIMITATIONS  OF  ITS  PROBATIVE 

FORCE. 


LECTUEE   I. 

A  PARTicuLAB  and  commanding  scheme  of  religion,  commonly 
known  by  the  name  Christianity,  has  for  many  centuriea 
been  in  the  world.  The  name  is  not  one  given  to  it  in  its  own 
early  books,  but  one  which,  by  the  common  consent  of  its  advo- 
cates and  its  opponents,  has  come  to  describe  it.  It  is  primarily 
presented  in  a  collection  of  writings,  about  the  date  of  the 
authorship  of  which,  or  of  some  of  which,  there  has  been  pro- 
longed discussion  among  scholars,  but  which  all  now  admit  to 
have  come  from  the  earlier  part  of  that  era  of  time  in  which 
we  live  :  from  a  period  not  later,  at  the  latest,  than  the  age  of 
Hadrian,  or  of  the  first  Antoninus. 

In  these  writings,  familiarly  known  in  the  homes  of  all  of  us, 
are  declarations  purporting  to  set  forth  facts  and  truths  concerning 
God,  on  the  one  hand,  and  Man,  on  the  other,  with  the  recip- 
rocal relations  between  them.  They  include,  also,  distinctive 
rules  for  conduct  and  for  character,  which  are  intimately  con- 
nected with  these  alleged  declarations  of  fact.  They  present 
impressive  warnings,  with  astonishing  correlative  promises,  as 
offering  incentives  for  obedience  to  these  rules ;  both  warnings 
and  promises  having  reference  in  part  to  the  present  experience 
of  man  on  earth,  but  in  another  and  larger  part  to  that  which  is 
affirmed  to  be  waiting  in  reserve  in  realms  of  being  beyond  the 
grave.  They  all  culminate,  these  Christian  writings,  in  the 
assertion  of  the  presence  in  the  world  at  a  certain  great  epoch, 
synchronizing  closely  with  the  historical  age  of  Augustus  and 
Tiberius,  of  an  extraordinary  Person  :  remarkable  in  power,  yet 
more  remarkable  in  wisdom  and  character ;  who  lived  in 
obscure  circumstances,  who  attracted  no  wide  immediate  atten- 
tion, who  died  before  his  middle  manhood  by  a  painful  and 
shameful  anticipated  death,  but  who  called  himself  "  the  Light 
of   the  World,"  who   claimed  a  preemment  relationship  with 


4  jSifERlTAL  WViiyENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY: 

God,  and'  to*  whom'  !iis'"f6li6wers  rendered  an  homage,  with  a 
voluntary  service,  as  singular  and  transcendent  as  was  his  sur- 
passipg  self-assertion. 

The  career  of  this  Person,  from  his  birth-place  to  his  sepulchre, 
and  even  afterward,  to  the  time  of  his  alleged  final  disappearance 
from  the  eyes  of  his  followers,  is  traced  in  these  writings,  with 
such  extraordinary  grace,  vividness,  and  felicity  of  narration,  as 
seem  to  many  to  make  the  records  quite  unequalled  in  human 
literature  ;  while,  with  this  principal  public  career,  and  the  por- 
trait of  character  conspicuous  in  it,  are  connected  also  biograph- 
ical allusions  which  bring  many  others  incidentally  before  us, 
with  an  account,  brief  but  animated,  of  the  stir  which  was  made 
in  Jewish,  Greek,  or  Koman  communities,  even  among  semi- 
barbarous  peoples,  by  the  teachings  of  him  whom  the  narratives 
present,  as  those  teachings  were  eagerly  distributed  by  the  men 
who  had  taken  from  him  their  lessons  and  law. 

I  am  not  now  concerned  to  put  any  interpretation  upon  these 
ancient  and  memorable  writings,  or  to  declare  what  in  my  opin- 
ion is  the  system  of  religion  which  they  include.  I  am  not 
concerned,  even,  to  ask  to  what  precise  date  they  should  be 
ascribed,  or  by  whose  pens  they  were  probably  written.  The 
only  point  to  which  I  have  occasion  to  call  attention  is  the  fact 
that  they  exist,  and  have  long  existed  ;  and  that  there  is  a  some- 
thing in  them,  the  exact  extent  and  nature  of  which  it  is  not  now 
my  province  to  indicate,  which  constitutes  the  religion  known  as 
Christianity.  Before  the  time  when  these  writings  were  traced 
upon  the  first  papyrus  or  parchment,  that  religion  had  been 
declared  to  individual  minds.  The  writings  only  seek  clearly 
and  permanently  to  present  it  to  mankind.  It  is  to  be  found  to- 
day in  them,  in  its  original  meaning  and  scope,  and  not  in  any 
subsequent  writings  displacing  them,  or  adding  to  them  discord- 
ant elements.  Whatever  changes  have  since  occurred  in  human 
opinion,  whatever  varieties  of  controlling  interpretation  have 
been  sought  to  be  imposed  on  the  New  Testament  Scriptures,  it 
is  undeniable,  certainly  among  Protestant  disciples,  that  they 
hold  Christianity,  as  nothing  else  does;  and  that  in  them,  first 
and  supremely,  must  be  sought  the  religion  whose  impression 
upon  history  has  been  positive  and  enduring. 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  5 

It  is  with  Christianity,  in  this  respect  at  least,  as  it  is  with  the 
sunshine.  That  may  be  hidden  behind  thick  clouds.  It  may 
seem  grotesquely  or  hideously  tinted,  by  steaming  vapors  lising 
to  intercept  it  from  forges  and  factories,  from  chemical  labora- 
tories, or  from  the  noisome  reek  of  slums.  But  these  pass  away, 
and  the  sunshine  continues :  the  same  to-day,  when  we  untwist 
its  strand  into  the  crimson,  gold,  and  blue,  as  when  it  fell  on  the 
earliest  bowers  and  blooms  of  the  earth  ;  of  a  unity  too  perfect  to 
be  impaired  by  assault,  of  a  purity  too  essential  to  contract  de- 
filement from  what  in  nature  is  most  foul.  So  Christianity,  which 
has  certainly  been  variously  tinted  and  refracted  in  the  represen- 
tations which  men  have  made  of  it,  continues,  nevertheless,  in 
its  spiritual  substance,  in  whatever  it  has  of  an  irradiating  beauty 
or  of  vitalizing  force,  in  these  primitive  writings ;  and  it  still 
will  shine  from  them,  in  all  that  it  possesses  of  grace  or  glory, 
till  man's  labor  on  .earth  is  ended.  As  it  was  at  the  beginning,  and 
will  be  to  the  end,  the  religion  remains  manifested  to  the  world 
by  Gospels  and  Epistles.  They  did  not  create,  but  they  certain- 
ly represent  it.  Each  student  is  to  search  them,  with  candid 
attention,  to  find  it  for  himself,  with  a  practical  certainty  than 
which  the  scientific  should  not  be  more  sure ;  and  as  long  as 
these  writings  continue  to  be  read,  the  Christianity  which  pre- 
ceded them,  which  gave  them  form,  which  has  been  the  chief 
element  of  their  power,  and  which  still  becomes  articulate 
through  them,  will  not  cease  to  be  discernible  by  man. 

The  system  of  religion  thus  anciently  introduced  to  the 
knowledge  of  men,  and  thus  preserved  and  presented  to  us  in 
its  original  meaning  and  spirit  in  these  remarkable  writings,  has 
been  affirmed  from  the  outset,  is  now  believed  by  multitudes  of 
persons,  to  be  of  Divine  origin  and  authority:  to  be  TjO  in  a 
sense  so  paramount  and  unique  that  no  other  system  known 
among  men  can  cLiim  similar  origin  or  an  equal  authority.  It  is 
not  affirmed,  certainly,  that  everything  in  other  religions  has  been 
untrue :  that  they  may  not  have  had  in  some  respects  an  emi- 
nent value,  as  coming  from  minds  greatly  gifted,  and  from  hearts 
pervaded  by  devout  and  discerning  religious  feeling.  But  it  is 
affirmed  that  this  system  alone  is  so  fully  representative  of  the- 
Divine  Mind,  revealing  itself  to  and  through  the  human  spirit^, 


6  EJTTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY: 

that  it,  and  it  only,  has  a  complete  and  peremptory  claim  to  be 
believed  and  to  be  obeyed,  whatever  difficulties  its  disciples  may 
encounter,  whatever  dangers,  shames,  or  deaths,  they  may  have 
on  its  behalf  to  face. 

This  is  not  an  impression  among  the  ignorant  or  the  credu- 
lous alone,  or  among  those  practically  indifferent  to  the  subject, 
whose  traditional  impressions  hardly  rise  to  the  dignity  of 
definite  convictions.  It  is  the  matured  and  assured  belief 
of  many  of  the  most  thoughtful,  cultured,  free-spirited  of  men, 
whose  attainment  and  aspiration  are  exceptionally  high,  by  whom 
the  question  thus  determined  is  recognized  as  one  of  superlative 
significance,  and  in  whom  this  affirmative  persuasion  has  often- 
times been  slowly  produced,  sometimes  against  great  inward  re- 
luctance, and  only  after  a  searching  scrutiny  of  arguments  and 
proofs.  At  the  close  of  all,  as  the  crowning  result,  they  have 
this  conviction :  that  the  Christianity  implicitly  contained  in  all 
the  Bible,  but  specially  declared  in  the  New  Testament,  it,  and 
it  only,  comes  to  man  as  the  religion  designed  for  him  by  God : 
that  it  issued  from  the  sovereign  wisdom  and  the  unshadowed 
goodness  of  the  Infinite  Mind,  and  has  upon  it  the  authority  of 
that;  that  it  is,  therefore,  to  be  the  universal  religion  of  the 
world  ;  while  he  who  now  trusts  it,  trusts  the  same  intelligence 
and  holy  will  which  set  stars  in  their  courses,  and  hung  upon 
them  the  pendulous  planets.  In  the  judgment  of  such  minds, 
Christianity  is  an  authentic  instruction  given  to  mankind  by  the 
Author  of  the  Universe,  as  to  what  in  the  highest  departments  of 
moral  life  it  is  needful  for  men  to  believe  and  to  do.  It  is  the 
one  system  of  religion  on  earth  for  which  the  eternal  creative 
Spirit  from  w>.om  the  spirit  of  man  is  derived  is  directly  re- 
sponsible, and  to  which  His  veracity  is  pledged. 

This  is  certainly  a  stupendous  claim :  which  it  is  well-nigh 
blasphemous  to  make,  unless  it  is  sustained  by  sufficient  evidence, 
of  whose  validity  and  force  we  are  sure ;  which  it  is  in  a  high 
degree  perilous  to  admit,  if  our  minds  and  moral  natures  are  not 
satisfied  of  its  justness ;  but  which,  on  the  other  hand,  it  involves 
a  large  responsibility  to  deny,  unless  we  do  this  upon  good 
grounds,  and  are  confident  that  the  claim  should  not  be  allowed. 
No  other   question   can  be  to  us  of  superior  importance,  as 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  7 

matched  against  the  question  whether  the  religion  of  that  JN'ev^ 
Testament  which  is  our  inheritance  has  come  to  us  from  God. 
or  is  the  product  of  human  logic,  conjecture,  or  legend.  Tha 
compound  question  of  the  existence  and  character  of  God  is  the 
only  one  which  concerns  more  deeply,  if  even  that  does  so,  oiu 
moral  life. 

It  is  a  claim,  as  we  know,  which  is  not  peculiar  to  this  re-, 
ligion,  but  which  has  been  made,  and  is  still  made,  by  others, 
though  not  perhaps  in  a  tone  as  imperative,  or  as  contemplating 
relations  equally  universal.  Other  schemes  of  religion,  for  the 
most  part  at  least,  claim  rather  to  be  Divine  each  for  its  locality 
and  people;  to  have  been  a  gift  from  the  unseen  Powers  to 
those  who  possess  them,  rather  than  to  all  the  families  of  man- 
kind ;  and  the  missionary  instinct — though  in  the  instance  of 
Buddhism  it  has  been  singularly  active — is  thus  not  common 
under  the  teachings  of  the  ethnic  religions.  At  the  same  time, 
however,  these  claim  to  have  a  supreme  authority  over  the 
peoples  to  whom  they  severally  pertain ;  to  have  come  to  them, 
not  from  man's  wit  or  device,  but  from  the  inexhaustible  sources 
of  wisdom  in  the  heavens  above.  Gautama,  Confucius,  or 
Lao-tse,  may  neither  of  them  have  claimed  for  themselves  celes 
tial  inspirations ;  but  their  followers  have,  with  a  growing  en- 
thusiasm, ascribed  such  to  them,  and  no  other  religions,  outside 
of  Christendom,  have  had  wider  power,  have  held  their  adher- 
ents with  firmer  grasp,  or  have  been  more  emphatically  honored 
as  Divine,  than  these,  which  started  on  a  basis  of  natural  ethics 
and  of  human  philosophy. 

Christianity,  therefore,  is  but  one  among  many  religions,  in 
claiming  Divine  authorship  for  itself,  with  a  correlative  Divine 
authority  over  the  hearts  and  minds  which  it  reaches. 

It  is  a  claim,  I  need  not  remind  you,  which  many  whoUy  and 
vehemently  reject,  who  are  not  partisans  of  any  other  religion, 
but  who  confidently  affirm  that  all  religious  faiths  and  forms, 
Christianity  included,  have  had  common  origin  in  the  native  re- 
ligious sentiment  of  man ;  that  no  one  of  them,  therefore,  has 
any  peculiar  Divine  authority  ;  that  all  are  of  necessity  imper- 
fect, if  not  as  yet  wholly  rudimental ;  and  that  others  surpassing 
them  are  doubtless  to  appear,  as  other  forms  ol  science,  philoso- 


8  EJ^TERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  GHUISTIANITT : 

pliy,  of  social  manners,  of  government,  of  invention,  are  con. 
stantly  appearing,  till  the  Absolute  Religion,  the  Religion  oi 
Humanity,  shall  at  last  be  attained.  They  do  not  admit  that 
God  has  given  any  religion — according  to  their  conception  of 
things  it  would  be  essentially  out  of  accord  with  His  adminis- 
tration to  give  a  religion — in  an  early  time,  to  a  special  people, 
as  the  ultimate  system  for  the  world,  in  all  ages. 

Such  antagonists  of  the  paramount  claims  of  Christianity  are 
many  and  able.  They  have  often  been  nourished  in  knowledge 
and  power  by  the  religion  whose  place  of  solitary  preeminence 
in  the  world  they  dispute  or  deny.  Its  authority  they  repel, 
but  its  vital  impulse  is  in  their  blood.  They  become  more  nu- 
merous, rather  than  less  so,  as  civilization  advances.  They  are 
not  to  be  confounded  with  the  ribald  and  furious  assailants  of 
Christianity,  whose  vulgar  roughness  of  attack,  whose  malice, 
and  sometimes  their  mendacity  of  spirit,  have  done  so  much  to 
heap  moral  discredit  on  the  name  "  unbeliever ";  or  with  those 
who,  in  reckless  eagerness  for  applause,  ^  to  win  a  clap,  would  not 
scruple  to  sink  a  continent.'  These  men,  who  simply  put  Christi- 
anity, in  its  origin  and  authority,  on  the  level  of  other  religions, 
regarding  all  as  equally  destitute  of  any  supreme  Divine  claim 
upon  human  regard,  are  frequently  as  delicate  as  they  are  dili- 
gent and  dexterous  in  their  war  with  the  sentiment  in  which 
they  were  nurtured.  In  the  dignity  and  charm  of  their  social 
spirit,  of  their  moral  habitudes,  as  in  the  vigor  and  variety  of 
their  mental  action,  or  the  abundance  of  their  mental  resources, 
they  are  often  deserving  of  cordial  esteem. 

While  then,  on  the  one  hand,  the  Christianity  which  is  brought 
to  us  in  the  Kew  Testament  asserts  for  itself  this  supreme  and 
enduring  authority,  as  being,  in  a  sense  transcendent  and  ex- 
clusive, revealed  from  God ;  while  other  religions  claim  much 
the  same  thing,  at  least  as  related  to  the  peoples  which  receive 
them,  and  gather  around  their  ancient  origins  the  shining  mists 
of  alleged  Divine  converse  with  men ;  and  while  speculative 
philosophers,  in  indifference  to  all,  with  a  controlling  Pyrrhonic 
tendercy,  rule  all  alike  out  of  the  category  of  Divine  institutes, 
and  attribute  all  to  the  more  or  less  cultured  spirit  of  man :  it 
becomes  to  us  a  duty,  than  which  hardly  any  can  be  more  urgent, 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  9 

to  examine  this  stupendous  claim  of  Christianity,  and  to  see  if 
there  appear  reason  to  accept  it,  or  if,  on  the  other  hand,  there 
be  such  an  absence  of  reasons  for  this  that  the  claim  may  by  ua 
be  properly  dismissed,  as  either  exaggerated  or  wholly  untrue. 
There  has  never  been  a  time,  in  the  last  eighteen  centuries, 
when  it  was  not  appropriate  and  important  to  do  this.  I  might 
almost  say  that  there  never  has  been  a  time  when  precisely  this 
office  was  not  being  accomplished,  by  the  inquisitive  minds  of 
men,  by  their  reflective  and  searching  hearts.  And  there  will 
not  come  a  time  when  the  pertinence  and  significance  of  such  a 
discussion  will  not  be  obvious,  so  long  as  there  are  those  still 
living  on  the  earth,  in  the  same  communities,  with  minds  inter- 
acting upon  each  other,  who  on  the  one  hand  with  confidence 
affirm,  and  on  the  other  hand  with  eagerness  deny,  this  impres- 
sive and  surpassing  proposition. 

But  at  no  time  in  the  Past  has  the  question  more  distinctly 
demanded  discussion,  at  no  time  may  it  in  the  Future,  than  it 
does  at  this  moment :  when  the  world,  by  the  superb  advances 
of  its  general  civilization,  seems  in  the  judgment  of  many  to  be 
growing  superior  to  the  need  of  religion,  as  it  certainly  is  be- 
coming less  sensitive  to  its  influence;  when  it  seeks,  as  by  a 
general  impulse,  in  cultivated  lands,  to  shake  itself  free  from 
what  it  fears  as  a  fetter  on  its  thought ;  and  when  science, 
philosophy,  history,  are  invoked,  to  show  alleged  faults  or  crude 
apprehensions  in  this  religion,  or  to  overturn  its  essential  dec- 
larations. Not  any  more  ingenious  objections  than  had  before 
been  urged,  not  any  larger  array  of  learning  on  the  side  of  un- 
belief, not  any  more  attractive  and  elaborate  eloquence  convey- 
ing the  materials  for  assault  upon  the  Faith — not  any  of  these, 
BO  much  as  the  general  drift  of  mind,  in  Christendom  at  large, 
toward  secular  aims  and  secular  success,  and  toward  a  correspond- 
ing indifference  or  aversion  to  the  sovereign  claim  of  Christi- 
anity upon  it — this  makes  it  needful  to  consider  that  claim,  and 
to  decide  for  ourselves  whether  it  be  as  sound  and  imperative  as 
many  have  believed  it  in  the  Past,  as  many  still  gladly  believe 
It.  We  cannot  surely  be  indifferent  to  the  question;  and  it  is 
a  wise  maxim  which  Carlyle  repeats,  in  closing  his  second  essay 
on  Richter,  '  what  is  extraordinary,  try  to  look  at  with  your  own 


XO  EJTERJSAL  EVIDENCE  FOR   CHRISTIANITY: 

eyes.'  I  know  of  nothing  to  which  the  maxim  applies  more 
directly,  with  greater  force,  than  to  the  claim  of  Christianity 
upon  us. 

And  certainly  for  no  others  is  such  an  inquiry  more  pertinent 
or  important  than  for  those  who  expect  to  teach  this  religion, 
that  others  may  be  led  to  accept  and  obey  it.  Clearness  and 
thoroughness  of  conviction,  on  the  subject  of  the  Divine  origin 
of  Cliristianity,  are  to  such  men  indispensable;  unless  they 
would  build  the  whole  structure  of  their  work  not  so  much  on 
the  sand  as  on  the  surface  of  shifting  tides.  They  must  have 
canvassed  and  felt  the  proofs  that  God  has  given  superlative 
authority  to  the  message  which  they  carry,  or  their  words  will 
be  as  deficient  in  power  to  move  mankind  as  is  the  mimic  agony 
of  the  opera,  as  wanting  in  heat  as  is  pictured  flame. 

This,  therefore,  is  the  subject  which  we  confront,  and  concern- 
ing which  I  would  bring  such  suggestions  as  I  may  in  this  series 
of  Lectures.  The  line  of  argument  which  I  hope  to  exhibit  is 
not  suddenly  conceived,  though  it  has,  of  necessity,  to  be  rapidly 
and  very  imperfectly  presented.  I  found  in  it  long  ago,  and 
have  found  in  it  since,  a  delicate  yet  strong  persuasion  for  my- 
self of  the  truth  of  the  claim  which  Christianity  makes.  I  would 
fain  hope  that  it  may  in  a  measure  impart  this  to  you.  At  least, 
I  trust  that  He  whom  all  but  the  atheists  accept  as  in  HimseH 
the  perfect  Truth  will  keep  me  from  saying  anything  untrue,  o) 
anything  misleading  in  its  impression  ;  and  that  He  will  so  guide 
and  control  us  in  considering  the  theme  that  all  our  words,  and 
all  our  thoughts,  in  their  final  effect,  shall  conspire  to  His  glory  ! 

Two  embarrassments  detain  one  at  the  start,  in  advancing 
to  the  subject.  One  arises  from  the  fact,  obvious  to  all,  that 
opinions  widely  differing  have  prevailed,  and  still  prevail,  as  to 
what  Christianity  actually  is,  in  its  substance  and  scope,  in  the 
intimate  and  organizing  elements  which  compose  it.  They  pre- 
vail not  merely  among  those  who  stand  altogether  outside  the 
range  of  its  discipleship,  but  in  the  societies  which  accept  it ; 
among  those  who  equally  feel  and  affirm  that  they  are  adherents 
of  the  religion.  So  it  may  be  naturally  asked,  "  What  is  this 
Christianity,  the  claim  of  which  to  a  Divine  origin,  and  a  related 
Divine  authority,  we  are  to  investigate  ? " 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  H 

Ig  it  the  doctrine  that  Jesus  was  a  man,  singularly  gifted,  nobly 
consecrated,  of  a  really  surpassing  genius  for  religion,  with  ex 
traordinary  power  for  morally  impressing  and  inspiring  others, 
who  spoke  words  of  such  sovereign  significance  that  the  world 
has  not  been  able  to  forget  them,  who  gave  a  rule  of  action  and 
of  spirit  exceptionally  pure,  while  his  life  corresponded,  in  its 
harmonious  beauty  and  majesty,  with  the  precepts  which  he 
uttered  ;  who  has  thus  been  able  to  affect  generations  subsequent 
to  his  time,  in  parts  of  the  world  which  he  had  not  traversed  ; 
but  who  stood  after  all  on  a  level  of  nature  with  ourselves,  and 
only  surpassed  us  in  the  fineness  and  reach  of  his  moral  intui- 
tions, and  in  his  power  of  imparting  to  others  of  the  fullness  of 
his  rare  and  kingly  spirit?  Is  this  what  you  mean — the  pre- 
cepts, rules,  and  thoughts  of  truth,  announced  by  this  man — 
when  you  speak  of  Christianity  ? 

Or  is  it  the  doctrine,  widely  accepted,  that  He,  being  essen- 
tially Divine,  but  taking  upon  Him  our  nature  in  the  wonder  of 
the  Incarnation,  founded  an  organic  visible  Church,  to  abide  on 
the  earth,  with  ritual  and  hierarchy,  into  which  one  is  brought 
by  regenerating  baptism,  in  which  he  is  nourished  in  goodness 
and  truth  by  effectual  sacraments,  and  through  whose  authorized 
officiating  priests  he  obtains  absolution  and  remission  of  sins  ;  a 
Church  in  which  the  Lord  is  evermore  personally  although  mys- 
tically present ;  which  is,  therefore,  empowered  to  teach  perpetu- 
ally, without  doubt  or  error,  in  His  name ;  through  whose 
sacraments,  as  orderly  administered.  His  personal  energy  is  con- 
tinually exerted ;  and  by  which,  in  its  continuance  on  earth,  His 
Incarnation  becomes  perpetual,  and  is  made  universal  through- 
out the  Church  ?  Is  this  the  Christianity,  whose  claim  to  be 
considered  Divine  in  origin  and  authority  you  would  wish  us  to 
consider  ? 

Or  is  it,  again,  that  system  of  doctrine  which  sometimes  is 
called  "the  evangelical,"  which  is  also  accepted  in  large  parts  of 
the  world  where  this  religion,  coming  from  Palestine,  has  got 
itself  established  :  which  teaches  that  man  is  by  nature  depraved, 
in  the  governing  temper  and  tendency  of  his  heart ;  that  this 
depravity  reveals  itself  with  certainty  in  the  natural  and  con- 
tinuing action  of  his  life ;  that  Christ  came  to  the  world  as  a 


12  EXTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR   CHRISTIANITY: 

Redeemer,  uniting  in  Himself  the  human  nature  with  th« 
Divine ;  that  He  died  on  the  cross  to  make  atonement  for  huraar, 
transgression ;  that  having  then  ascended  into  heaven  He  sent 
forth  thence  the  Holy  Spirit,  to  enlighten,  convert,  and  purifj^ 
men  ;  that  the  Church  on  eartli  is  simply  the  great  invisible  com. 
munion  of  those  who  believe,  love,  and  obey,  with  reverent  affec- 
tion, this  Son  of  God ;  and  that  beyond  our  present  palpable 
sphere  of  being  are  realms  of  recompense,  for  evil  and  for  good, 
into  which  each  shall  pass  at  death,  and  in  which  character,  with 
the  destiny  involved,  remains  indelible  ?  Is  this,  or  any  similar 
system  not  essentially  divergent  from  this,  the  Christianity, 
concerning  whose  origin,  and  whose  rightful  authority,  you  would 
have  us  inquire  ? 

I  admit,  of  course,  the  propriety  of  the  question,  after  one  has 
come  to  a  definite  impression,  or,  better  still,  to  a  serious  con- 
clusion, that  there  is  a  system,  whatever  in  the  end  that  may- 
show  itself  to  be,  which  is  presented  in  these  ancient  writings, 
and  which  has  fair  claim  to  be  considered  as  having  originate<l  in 
a  mind  above  man's,  and  in  the  will  everlasting  and  Divine. 
But  it  is  precisely  that  preceding  question  which  I  am  to  con- 
sider :  while,  after  an  answer  to  that  has  been  given,  affirmative 
and  decisive,  it  will  be  in  order  for  each  to  consider,  with  the 
most  sincere  and  intent  application  of  his  supreme  faculty  for 
the  work,  what  is  that  system  which  composes  ^'  Christianity." 
The  question  before  us  does  not  forestall  that.  It  simply  leads 
toward  it,  and  prepares  the  way  for  it.  I  may  see  that  the  earth 
has  been  builded  by  a  Power  invisible  and  supernal,  though  I 
do  not  yet  know  the  interior  secrets  of  its  material  or  chemical 
constitution :  what  gulfs  of  fire  are  under  its  crust,  or  how  it  is 
balanced  on  other  stars.  One  may  lead  another  to  the  front  of 
a  palace,  and  make  him  aware  that  it  was  surely  erected  by  a 
king,  though  he  has  not  as  yet  seen  the  treasures  within,  of 
jewels,  mosaics,  pictures,  marbles,  and  costly  marquetry.  So  it 
is  plainly  and  surely  possible  to  have  a  conviction  that  that  re- 
ligion  which  lies  in  the  writings  that  by  common  consent  con- 
tain Christianity  has  come  from  God,  and  not  from  the  genius 
or  will  of  man,  though  we  have  not  as  yet  developed  for  our- 
selves, and  set  in  their  relations,  its  constituting  doctrines.     It  i». 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE,  13 

this  primary  inquiry,  not  any  which  comes  later,  in  regard  tr. 
which  at  present  I  would  offer  suggestions. 

But  here  the  second  embarrassment  confronts  us,  which  in- 
volves plainly  a  graver  difficulty  than  does  the  preceding.  It 
arises  from  the  fact  that  the  religion  itself  makes  a  personal 
spiritual  experience  of  its  power  the  only  iinal  evidence  for  it. 
"  Taste  and  see  that  the  Lord  is  good ";  "  if  any  man  be 
minded  to  do  the  will  of  my  Father  in  heaven,  he  shall  know  of 
the  teaching,  whether  it  be  of  God,  or  whether  I  speak  of  my- 
self ":  these  are  consenting  representative  declarations  from  the 
older  writings  and  the  later  of  what  is  called  among  us  The  Bible, 
which  harmonize  with  many  others  in  setting  forth  the  fact  that 
only  by  spiritual  experiment  of  the  Gospel  can  man  be  assured 
of  its  Divine  origin,  as  ultimately  proved  by  its  Divine  energy. 
All  other  impressions  of  this  must  be,  in  the  nature  of  the  ease, 
preparatory,  rudiraental.  Only  by  trying  it  do  men  find  with 
what  subtle  and  exquisite  adaptation  the  air  is  fitted  to  the 
lungs,  so  that  by  inhaling  it  their  life  is  reinforced.  Only  by 
joyful  experience  of  it  is  such  a  certainty  produced  in  the  mind 
of  the  inestimable  beauty  of  sunshine,  as  could  have  been  formed, 
as  can  be  shaken,  by  no  argument  conceivable.  Imagine  the 
attempt  to  make  that  beauty  as  certain  as  it  is  to  us,  to  one  who 
had  passed  his  entire  life  in  the  unlighted  cavern  !  So  it  is  only 
by  trying  Christianity,  in  its  fitness  to  our  deepest  personal  needs, 
of  alliance  with  God,  of  moral  renovation,  of  tranquillity,  and  of 
hope,  that  men  can  become  utterly  certain  that  it  is  from  above  ; 
not  a  fabric,  any  more  than  the  earth  is,  of  human  fancy,  or  a  con- 
struction of  human  logic,  or  even  a  brilliant  and  lofty  surmise 
of  human  aspiration  ;  but  a  Divine  system,  as  is  the  atmosphere, 
as  is  radiant  light,  presented  by  God  to  the  world  of  mankind 
for  their  permanent  sovereign  life  and  peace. 

Every  religion  must  have  it  for  its  office  to  bring  men  to  God. 
Mental  philosophy,  ethics,  art,  have  other  purposes.  A  religion, 
by  its  nature,  must  have  this  for  its  object,  sublime  and  special 
If  one  has  found  this  accomplished  in  himself  by  Christianity, 
it  may  reasonably  be  said,  he  will  need  no  further  argument  to 
prove  that  that  which  thus  lifts  him  into  intimate  and  conscious 
alliance  with  his  Maker  has  come  from  Him.     No  stilts,  con 


14:  EXTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY: 

Btructed  in  human  workshops,  can  enable  man  to  walk  on  the 
level  of  stars.  No  legend  or  logic  can  lift  one  to  new  and  essen. 
tial  fellowship  with  Ilira  whose  wisdom  governs  the  universe 
which  His  holiness  illumines.  If  one  has  not  this  experience  ol 
the  system,  in  its  efficacious  and  beautiful  virtue,  all  external 
argument,  in  the  absence  of  this,  must  be  an  ineffective  marshal- 
ling of  words :  a  breath  of  air,  set  in  motion  for  a  moment,  and 
speedily  absorbed  in  the  great  world-currents  that  play  and  pul- 
sate around  the  globe. 

I  do  not  in  the  least  overlook  the  importance  of  the  difficulty 
thus  stated.  As  against  the  iinal  demonstrative  value  of  any  ex- 
ternal argument  for  Christianity,  it  is  insurmountable.  It  must 
be  impossible,  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  to  give  one  a  vivdd  and 
governing  conviction  of  the  Divine  source  and  the  heavenly 
mission  of  a  religion,  by  intellectual  suggestions.  He  can  gain 
that,  as  I  fully  believe,  only  by  experience:  as  one  learns  in 
practice  the  virtue  of  a  medicine,  the  tonic  value  of  a  strength- 
ening cordial,  or  the  strange  power  to  conquer  pain  which  lurks 
in  the  odorous  anaesthetic.  The  kind  of  faith,  if  such  it  may  be 
called,  which  is  based  simply  upon  extiinsic  proofs,  is  never  one 
to  quicken  joy,  to  inspire  to  service,  or  to  win  from  others  sym- 
pathetic response.  It  fails  in  the  grand  emergencies  of  life.  It 
cannot  have  the  settled  security,  the  vital  energy,  it  cannot  in- 
spire the  overmastering  enthusiasm,  which  belong  to  the  faith 
that  is  born  of  experience.  To  take  the  just  distinction  of 
Maurice,  a  man  may  come  to  hold  a  religion,  in  consequence  of 
its  external  proofs ;  but  that  religion  will  not  hold  him,  in  its  con- 
stant, subtle,  and  stimulating  grasp,  except  through  his  experi- 
ence of  it. 

But  again,  my  inquiry  is  so  primary  in  its  nature  that  this  ob- 
jection does  not  really  challenge  it.  I  go  back  to  meet  a  prior 
stage  of  mental  and  spiritual  search  for  the  truth,  and  the  ques- 
tion which  waits  for  our  answer  is  this :  Is  there,  or  is  there  not, 
such  a  fair,  obvious,  antecedent  probability  that  Christianity  ia 
from  God,  that  each  conscientious  and  intelligent  man  should 
study  it  for  himself,  should  master  it  in  its  statements,  require- 
ments, offers,  should  set  himself  in  intimate  personal  harmony 
with  its  law  and  life — thus  making  a  sufficient  experiment  of  it 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  15 

by  accepting  and  applying  it  to  his  own  soul  ?  I  would  only,  aa 
before,  lead  the  unconvinced  mind  up  to  the  system,  as  it  stands 
declared  in  the  New  Testament,  and  show  him  such  reasons  for 
believing  it  Divine,  in  the  transcendent  sense,  as  may  persuade 
him,  as  may  forcibly  prompt  him,  to  investigate  its  contents,  and 
to  see  if  on  spiritual  trial  of  its  energy  he  finds  in  it  a  really 
celestial  power  and  glory.  So,  only,  can  the  indestructible 
certainty  be  wrought  in  the  soul. 

But  the  steps  preliminary  may  yet  be  needful ;  as  needful  as 
IS  the  hand  of  him  who  leads  us  up  to  the  master-piece  of  the 
rich  gallery,  that  the  delicate  and  ethereal  charm  of  its  splendor 
may  stream  upon  us ;  as  needful  as  was  the  ancient  errand  of 
the  woman  of  Samaria,  who  called  the  men  to  see  that  Lord  of 
whom  afterward  they  said :  "  We  have  lieard  him  ourselves,  and 
know  that  this  is  indeed  the  Christ."  If  one  hold  himself  care- 
fully to  this  definite  purpose,  he  may  hope,  I  think,  to  do  service 
to  his  hearers ;  and  he  need  not  regard  the  sharp  sneer  of  Dr. 
Newman,  that  '  if  we  rely  much  on  argumentative  proof  as  the 
basis  of  personal  Christianity,  we  ought  in  consistency  to  take 
chemists  for  our  cooks,  and  mineralogists  for  our  masons.' 

One  other  embarrassment,  though  certainly  involving  far  less 
of  difficulty  than  those  which  I  have  mentioned — but  which  es- 
pecially confronts  one  who  would  gather  the  testimonies  offered 
to  Christianity  by  its  recorded  career  in  the  world — arises  from 
the  fact  that  some  of  the  worst  wickedness  on  the  earth  has  been 
wrought  ostensibly  on  behalf  of  this  religion,  by  those  who  have 
been  held  its  disciples  and  advocates.  The  fires,  kindled  pro- 
fessedly in  its  service,  have  lighted  with  their  glare  long  passages 
of  history.  The  cruelties,  lusts,  ambitions  of  those  who  have 
stood  as  princes  in  the  society  called  by  its  name — the  treacher- 
ies, conflagrations,  wholesale  murders,  accomplished  by  those 
who  have  borne  with  crimsoned  hands  its  consecrated  banners — 
these  are,  assuredly,  frightful  to  contemplate.  Men  may  seem  at 
first  fairly  justified  in  saying,  as  oftentimes  they  have  said :  "  If 
we  are  to  judge  the  tree  by  its  fruits,  which  even  the  New  Tes- 
tament requires  us  to  do,  then  the  system  must  be  intrinsically 
evil,  bom  of  man's  nature,  and  of  the  worst  part  of  it,  not  of 
God,  from  which  have  proceeded  effects  like  these.     If  we  are 


16  EJTEENAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY : 

not  at  liberty  absolutely  to  predicate  untruth  of  the  whole  of  it, 
we  may  say  that  it  cannot,  in  any  exclusive  and  preeminent 
sense,  be  from  His  mind  who  is  infinitely  pure,  since  it  has 
been  associated  with,  has  seemed  to  tolerate,  or  even  to  inspire, 
the  fiercest  and  foulest  vices  of  man." 

I  do  not  overlook  the  difiiculty,  here,  as  I  have  shown  by 
stating  it  in  strong  terms.  But  it  is  rather  apparent  than  real, 
and  does  not,  I  am  sure,  interpose  any  grave  or  governing  ob- 
stacle, to  a  reflective  and  candid  mind,  in  the  way  of  the  accept- 
ance of  Christianity  as  Divine.  The  physicist  has  to  recognize  a 
difference  between  the  theoretical  effect  of  a  force  acting  without 
friction,  in  ideal  freedom,  and  the  observed  effect  of  that  force, 
as  incessantly  though  silently  hindered  or  deflected  by  resistances 
of  matter.  How  vast  the  difference  between  the  harmonies  in 
the  soul  of  the  composer,  or  even  as  inscribed  on  the  musical 
score,  and  the  same  as  harshly  or  ignorantly  rendered  on  jangled 
strings !  An  original  energy  is  not  to  be  condemned  because  of 
imperfection  in  the  instruments  or  the  media  through  which  it  is 
revealed ;  as  the  sunshine  is  not  less  purely  lucid  when  it  pierces 
the  crystal  of  violet  or  of  ruby  ;  as  the  expansive  force  of  steam 
is  not  less  a  beneflcent  instrument  because  it  explodes  the  im- 
perfect steam-chamber,  or  drives  the  ship,  carelessly  piloted, 
crashing  upon  reefs.  However  Divine  Chi-istianity  may  be,  and 
in  whatever  superlative  sense,  if  human  nature  be  what  it  postu- 
lates,  so  darkly  obscured,  so  vitally  disordered,  as  to  need  a 
Divine  intervention  to  amend  it,  it  is  not  unnatural,  it  was  rather 
to  be  expected,  that  according  to  the  impact  of  this  religion  on 
any  spirit  remaining  unpurified  must  be  the  mischiefs  wrought 
in  its  name.  Hypocrisy  everywhere  counterfeits  virtue ;  and 
it  deepens,  as  shadows  do,  when  the  light  grows  intenser.  Fa- 
naticism  and  enthusiasm  are  near  of  kin.  It  is  only  a  moral 
difference  which  divides  them.  And  the  fierce  fanaticism  of  the 
sanguinary  bigot,  though  in  utter  contrast  with  the  vivid  en- 
thusiasm of  the  devout  and  humble  disciple,  may  simply  show 
the  tremendous  impression  made  by  the  religion  upon  a  temper 
which  it  does  not  essentially  overcome  and  renew. 

The  Keligion,  in  other  words,  is  not  disproved  by  the  fact 
that  the  alien  and  hostile  human  will  has  mistaken  or  misapplied 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE  17 

it.  Rather,  as  poisonous  weeds  grow  must  fruitfully  on  soils 
made  prolific  by  culture,  and  under  a  glowing  baptism  of  sim- 
shine,  so  crimes  and  shaniies,  if  the  germs  of  them  continue  in 
human  nature,  may  onl}^  come  to  more  frightful  exhibition  be- 
neath the  force  of  a  religion  from  above.  The  impression 
which  they  make  on  the  quickened  public  moral  sensibility  will 
certainly  be  sharper  than  in  the  absence  of  such  a  religion.  It 
is  not  improbable  that  their  intrinsic  evil  energy  may  be  aug- 
mented. 

I  do  not  assume  anything,  then,  as  to  the  essential  interior 
constitution  of  that  religion  declared  in  the  Kew  Testament. 
1  do  not  fail  to  recognize  the  fact  that  only  by  inner  experience 
of  its  power  can  we  fully  know  if  this  religion  has  come  to  U8- 
from  God.  I  do  not  overlook  the  disastrous  fact  that  it  has  by 
no  means  done  as  yet  its  fairly  authenticating  work  in  the  world ; 
♦•■hat  it  has  even  incurred,  often,  a  heavy  opprobrium  from  the 
gross  and  fierce  wickedness  of  its  adherents.  But  admitting  all 
this,  and  looking  at  Christianity  not  now  analytically,  but  simply 
as  a  historical  Faith,  confessedly  discovered  to  the  world  at  the 
outset  of  our  era,  and  represented  to  day,  to  whomsoever  would 
clearly  find  it,  in  these  ancient  writings,  I  ask  myself  if  there  is 
any  obvious,  forcible,  presumptive  evidence  that  that  Religion, 
so  declared,  has  come  to  us  from  God  as  its  author?  Is  there 
such  evidence,  so  far  potential,  as  to  properly  impel  men  to- 
study  Christianity  with  a  profound  and  faithful  attention :  to 
make  themselves  masters,  by  such  attention,  of  whatever  of 
doctrine,  law,  promise,  or  of  alleged  spiritual  fact,  it  presents: 
and  then  to  make  personal  experiment  of  its  efficacy,  when  what 
;t  affirms,  and  what  it  requires,  has  to  them  become  evident  ? 

I  think  that  there  is  such  important  directive  and  preliminary 
evidence :  that  it  is  of  a  nature,  and  of  an  extent,  which  properly 
demand  that  it  be  fairly  pondered  by  all :  and  that  the  impres- 
sion received  from  it  will  become  always  stronger  as  it  is  more 
carefully  and  largely  considered.  And  along  a  particular  line  ot 
this  evidence  I  would,  in  the  Lectures  which  ai'e  to  follow,  con- 
duct your  thoughts. 

Even  here,  however,  a  distinct  limitation  must  be  recognized 
by  all.  Anything  approaching  demonstrative  proof,  absolutely 
2 


18  ETTERNAL  EVIDENOE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY: 

coercive  of  intellectual  assent,  cannot  be  demanded,  as  it  cannoi 
in  the  nature  of  the  case  be  supplied^  in  an  argument  of  this 
kind.  The  evidence  must  be  moral  in  its  nature,  and  such  as 
will  require,  for  the  fair  impression  of  its  probative  force,  not 
only  intelligence,  and  a  certain  amount  of  mental  discipline,  but 
moral  candor:  a  willingness  to  be  convinced:  even  a  cordial 
though  a  judicial  disposition  to  accept  the  conclusion,  if  such  ac- 
ceptance shall  appear  warranted  by  the  arguments  presented. 

All  moral  truth  requires  as  a  condition  of  its  acceptance  a 
moral  state  in  a  measure  at  least  sympathetic  with  itself.  There- 
fore, only,  does  it  test  character,  as  well  as  mould  it  Therefore 
is  it,  as  no  other  is,  a  judge  between  men.  You  can  compel  the 
assent  of  every  one,  who  has  intelligence  enough  to  follow  the 
necessary  processes  of  thought,  to  any  one  of  Euclid's  proposi- 
tions. You  can  by  experiment  compel  the  recognition  of  the 
presence  and  the  activity  of  the  crystallizing  force  in  the  turbid 
mixture  of  the  chemist.  But  you  cannot  so  show  the  beauty  of 
charity  to  the  habitual  and  passionate  miser,  or  the  beauty  of 
patriotism  to  the  embittered  and  preengaged  traitor,  as  to  com- 
pel either  to  see  the  charm  of  the  summoning  virtue.  To  argue 
the  moral  preeminence  for  man  of  dangerous  and  high  philan- 
thropical  enterprise  over  selfish  indulgence,  to  one  who  lives  only 
to  follow  inclination  or  to  gratify  lust — it  is  leading  the  deaf  to 
hear  oratorios,  or  showing  to  the  blind  the  charm  of  expansive 
summer  landscapes. 

Of  course,  these  are  special  exceptional  instances ;  taken  pur- 
posely as  such,  that  the  law  which  they  suggest  may  be  empha- 
sized before  us.  But  the  law  holds,  always :  that  where  moral 
truth  is  the  subject-matter  presented  to  the  mind,  the  mind  must 
not  withstand  it,  with  predetermined  hostility,  if  it  would  feel 
its  fair  impression.  It  must  at  least  be  willing  to  hear,  to 
seriously  reflect,  to  consider  candidly  what  arguments  may  be 
brought;  and  it  must  not  be  committed  against  a  conclusion,  it 
must  be  in  fact  quite  ready  to  receive  that,  if  the  arguments  for 
it  turn  out  to  be  sufficient.  In  this  way  we  discuss,  intelligently 
and  fruitfully,  the  character  of  men;  in  this  way,  the  propriety 
of  customs  or  legislations ;  in  this  way,  even,  the  qualities  and 
the  career  of  historical  persons,  or  of  public  institutions.    In  this 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORGE.  1^ 

W2iy  only  can  we  with  fairness  discuss  the  question  whether 
Christianity  comes  to  us,  in  any  transcendent  and  superlative 
sense,  from  the  Mind  unseen,  which  has  built  the  suns,  and  from 
which  our  conscious  life  has  sprung.  The  proposition  is  a  vast 
one.  It  is  addressed  to  the  spirit,  not  to  the  sense ;  to  the  con- 
science and  heart,  not  alone  to  the  critical  understanding.  It 
pertains  to  the  sphere  of  spiritual  truth.  The  argument  for  it 
can  only,  therefore,  be  moral  in  its  nature.  It  must  appeal  to 
a  temper  in  men  wholly  welcoming  and  receptive,  or  it  might  as 
well  be  addressed  to  fishes,  or  to  those  unacquainted  with  the 
accents  of  the  tongue  in  which  it  is  expressed.  There  is  pro- 
found truth  in  the  saying  of  a  Hindu,  quoted  by  Sir  William 
Jones :  *'  Whoever  obstinately  adheres  to  a  set  of  opinions  may 
at  last  bring  himself  to  believe  that  the  freshest  sandal-wood  is 
a  flame  of  lire."  * 

If  there  were  any  argument  for  Christianity  of  another  sort, 
coercive  not  persuasive,  demonstrative  and  scientific  not  moral 
and  probable,  it  would  certainly  have  been  discovered  long  since, 
in  the  centuries  which  this  energetic  religion  has  instructed, 
commanded,  and  filled  with  debate.  But  in  proportion  as  such 
an  argument  were  urged  and  distributed  it  would,  in  effect,  rob 
the  religion  of  its  supreme  office  as  a  witness  for  itself;  it  would 
exclude  opportunity  for  spiritual  faith,  as  involving  in  it  any 
personal  voluntary  element ;  it  would  cause  what  it  proved  to 
be  the  message  of  God  to  cease  to  be,  according  to  its  nature, 
*  a  discerner  of  the  thoughts  and  intents  of  the  heart.' 

Of  the  arguments  which,  within  these  inevitable  limits,  are 
adapted  to  convince  men  that  Christianity  is,  in  a  supreme  sense, 
of  a  Divine  origin,  and  of  world-wide  authority — so  far  to  convince 
them  as  to  lead  them  to  study  it  thoroughly  for  themselves,  and 
to  make  a  personal  experiment  of  it,  according  to  its  law — of 
these  there  are  several,  associated  naturally  under  the  title  of 
"External  Evidences."  The  study  of  theologians,  the  attention 
of  masters  of  speculative  thought,  in  fact  the  reflective  faculty 
of  the  world,  have  been  profoundly  occupied  with  them ;  and 
the  range  of  the  research  invited  and  thus  incited  by  them  is, 


*  Works  of  Sir  W.  Jones,  London  ed.,  1807,  Vol.  lU.,  p.  323. 


20  B^TFERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY : 

almost  literally,  without  a  horizon.  1  am  to  follow  one  path,  oi»ly, 
in  the  broad  expanse  thus  opened  before  us ;  and  that  path,  per. 
haps,  not  the  one  most  attractive,  or  promising  to  lead  to  most 
important  and  satisfying  results. 

The  early  disciples  found  a  sufficient  argument  for  themselves 
in  the  Miracles  which  were  wrought,  or  which  appeared  to  them 
to  be  wrought,  in  connection  with  this  religion.  They  recog. 
nized  in  these  the  signs  and  proofs  that  he  who  was  speaking, 
whether  directly  or  through  his  messengers,  was  speaking  with 
a  warrant  from  God  Himself.  The  fact  that  such  an  impression 
was  made,  in  early  times,  on  many  minds,  and  that  it  was  full 
of  inspiring  power,  cannot  be  questioned :  and  it  has  plainly  great 
significance.  Gibbon  sets  this  belief  in  miracles  prominently, 
you  remember,  among  the  causes  by  which  he  accounts  for  the 
spread  of  Christianity,  at  a  time  which  did  not  favor  it,  against 
»xiany  resistances.  The  influence  of  it  was  vividly  illustrated,  in 
multitudes  of  instances,  in  dungeon,  amphitheatre,  at  the  stake, 
on  the  cross.  And  the  argument  for  Christianity,  as  alone 
Divine,  which  is  derived  from  the  astonishing  supernatural 
manifestations  declared  to  have  attended  its  early  proclamation, 
is  still  pressed,  with  obvious  candor,  as  well  as  with  enthusiasm 
and  a  signal  ability,  by  many  of  its  apologists. 

I  need  not  perhaps  say  that  I  feel,  for  myself,  the  energetic 
and  the  continuing  force  of  the  argument  so  presented  ;  and  that 
I  have  no  word  of  objection,  only  words  of  sympathetic  approval, 
for  those  by  whom  it  is  urged  to-day  with  as  eager  an  eloquence 
as  flowed  from  either  lip  or  pen  of  the  most  eminent  Christian 
Fathers.  But  I  do  not  undertake  to  present  this  myself,  in  this 
series  of  Lectures.  Foi*  the  time,  at  least,  I  will  not  coirtest  an 
inch  of  the  ground  on  which  so  strenuous  a  warfare  has  been 
waged.  I  will  not  even  controvert  the  position,  if  men  choose 
to  take  it,  that  the  miracle,  after  so  many  centuries  of  apparently 
minterrupted  regularity  in  the  operations  of  cosmical  force,  is 
lot  easy  of  proof  except  in  connection  with  the  doctrine  sup- 
)orted  and  signalized  by  it,  and  with  the  conceded  supreme  per- 
sonality of  him  by  whose  will  it  is  alleged  to  have  been  wrought ; 
t\mt  the  religion,  in  other  words,  sustains  the  miracle,  as  truly 
as  Qoes  the  miracle  the  religion ;  and  that,  considered  in  inde- 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  21 

pendence  of  what  it  authenticates,  the  most  stupendous  physical 
effect  will  prove  power,  primarily,  rather  than  truth — will  be  a 
demonstration  of  incalculable  energy,  not  necessarily  an  evidence 
of  supreme  spiritual  loveliness  and  lordship. 

It  must  certainly  be  conceded  that  Jesus  himself,  according  to 
the  authoritative  records,  did  not  make  the  miracles  early  as- 
cribed to  him  the  means  of  persuading  men  at  large  to  accept 
and  obey  him,  so  much  as  the  means  of  confirming  or  rewarding 
a  previous  faith.  He  appealed  to  these  indeed,  before  his  ene- 
mies, and  made  their  responsibility  for  antagonism  to  him  o'.-ly 
dearer  and  more  perfect  because  of  these  works.  But  he  wrought 
them,  for  the  most  part,  either  in  private,  or  in  the  least  demon- 
strative manner :  as  if  they  had  simply  broken  from  him,  in  the 
abounding  spontaneity  of  his  love,  when  appropriate  occasions  at- 
tracted the  flashes  of  the  inner  effulgence,  rather  than  as  if  they 
had  been  his  prean-anged  instruments  for  converting  the  world, 
Jewish  and  Pagan. 

I  undoubtingly  believe,  for  myself,  the  reality  of  the  miracles 
thus  attributed  to  him.  The  lucid  and  lofty  simplicity  of  the 
story  in  which  they  are  told  is  of  itself  to  me  their  demonstra- 
tion. They  seem  to  furnish  the  only  explanation,  through  their 
effect  on  the  minds  of  the  disciples,  of  the  early  triumphs  of  the 
despised  Gospel  on  the  very  spot  where  its  Lord  had  been  cru- 
<jified,  and  of  the  victorious  energy  of  apostles  in  proclaiming 
that  Gospel,  in  spite  of  resistance,  and  in  defiance  of  flood  or 
flame.  I  feel  the  profound  truth  of  the  remark  of  Pascal,  that 
'*  as  nature  is  an  image  of  grace,  so  the  visible  miracles  are  but 
the  images  of  those  invisible  which  God  wills  to  accomplish."* 
The  whole  ISTew  Testament  would  become  to  me  inharmonious 
in  its  proportions,  timid  in  its  challenge  to  the  faith  of  the 
world,  emptied  of  the  ultimate  majesty  and  lustre  of  Omnipo- 
tent Love,  if  there  ever  should  be  expelled  from  its  tender 
and  dauntless  pages  these  sovereign  demonstrations  of  the  Di- 
vine Will,  immanent  in  the  person  and  illustrious  in  the  action 
of  him  who  as  Christ  claims  unique  authority  in  the  world.  But 
I  will  not  now  dispute  the  position  if  any  one  accounts  such 


*  "Pens^ea  *';  Paris  ed.,  1878;  Sec.  Par;  Art.  VIII.  2. 


22  EXTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITY: 

miracles  the  inner  light  shining  for  the  worshipper  in  the  IIol^ 
of  Holies,  rather  than  the  advanced  and  interpreting  torches 
with  which  he  is  lighted  on  his  way  to  the  sanctuary.  One 
may  reverently  accept  them  for  himself,  and  see  the  Divine 
glory  in  them,  without  using  them  as  instruments  for  the  per- 
suasion cf  others :  as  the  jeweled  sceptre  in  the  hand  of  the  king 
may  not  be  the  weapon  most  apt  for  use  in  subduing  an  armed 
and  fierce  opposition,  or  turning  the  refluent  tides  of  battle. 

An  argument  was  also  urged  at  the  beginning,  and  has  often 
been  repeated,  for  the  Divine  origin  of  Christianity,  based  upon 
the  fact,  widely  aflirraed,  that  Prophecies  written  centuries  be- 
fore were  fulfilled  in  events  which  subsequently  occurred,  in  the 
coming  and  the  life,  and  especially  in  the  death,  of  Jesus  of 
Kazareth  ;  and  that  this  necessarily  involves  the  conclusion  that 
Omniscience  was  engaged  in  the  previous  utterance,  and  presented 
a  certifying  assurance  of  the  fact  in  the  later  fulfilment.  The 
inference  is  inevitable  to  those  admitting  the  premise.  Only 
imperfectly,  and  with  infinite  diflSculty,  can  man  trace  backward 
a^  completed  course  of  historical  sequences,  and  ascertain  the 
small  germ  out  of  which  was  developed,  in  the  progress  of  cent- 
uries, the  final  result ;  the  tiny  rills,  by  whose  unnoticed  silent 
confluence  was  formed  at  last  the  irresistible  current.  To  reverse 
this  process,  and  forecast  the  end  from  the  beginning,  is  surely 
the  special  prerogative  of  God.  And  if  He  has  thus  seen  and 
declared  it,  before  it  came,  and  when  to  observant  human  eyes 
there  seemed  no  promise  of  its  coming,  there  is  an  end  of  debate 
on  the  question  of  His  immediate  connection  with  any  religion 
so  authenticated  by  Him.  Justin  Martyr  is  therefore  but  one 
among  many  who  by  the  study  of  Hebrew  prophecies,  as  illumined 
and  answered  by  the  subsequent  occurrence  of  stupendous  events, 
have  been  led  to  that  assurance  concerning  Christianity  wdiich  to 
him  was  more  satisfying  than  all  which  he  had  leai-ned  from 
Platonist  or  Stoic :  who  have  by  such  study  been  enabled  to 
enter  those  Agates  of  light'  which  his  illustrious  Athenian  mas- 
ter had  but  seen  in  far  fore-gleam. 

But  there  are  many — they  are  those  to  whom  the  pertinent 
arguments  on  this  great  theme  especially  need  to  be  pre- 
sented— who  do  not  admit  that   such   predictions  were  really 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  23 

rnade^  by  Isaiah,  for  example,  by  Daniel,  by  the  Psalmists,  or  by 
Moses.  They  affirm  the  predictions  attributed  to  these  to  have 
been  either  of  later  origin,  or  so  essentially  indeterminate  in 
their  nature  that  human  sagacity  might  have  suggested  their 
veiled  outlines,  upon  the  chance  of  future  events  responding  to 
them.  They  shelter  themselves  behind  the  fact  that  even  the 
Messianic  predictions,  to  a  spirit  so  profound,  perspicacious,  and 
devout,  though  also  so  free,  as  that  of  Schleiermacher,  seemed 
to  have  their  chief  value  in  the  evidence  which  they  offered  of 
the  striving  upward  of  human  nature  toward  Christianity,  and 
of  a  general  Divine  design  in  the  Mosaic  institutes  :  and  that  he, 
in  fact,  accepted  the  prophecies  on  the  authoi-ity  of  the  New 
Testament,  instead  of  basing  in  any  measure  his  sense  of  that 
authority  upon  the  predictions.  Without  following  in  his  steps, 
it  must  certainly  be  conceded  that  only  an  argument  for  which 
few  are  competent,  a  linguistic  as  well  as  a  historical  argument,  at 
once  minute  and  comprehensive,  can  so  set  predictions  in  their 
indisputable  historical  place,  and  show  them  in  their  indubitable 
meanings,  that  the  subsequent  facts,  in  their  plain  and  precise 
iorrespondence  with  these,  shall  demonstrate  them  Divine. 

A  general  course  of  Prophecy  fulfilled — it  seems  no  more  to 
require  a  mind  peculiarly  devout  to  find  this  in  the  Bible  than 
it  needs  such  a  mind  to  see  the  blending  stellar  brightness  of 
Milky  Way  constellations :  as  even  the  cautious  and  critical  De 
Wette  not  only  held  the  Old  Testament  a  great  prophecy,  a  great 
Vype,  of  Him  who  was  to  come,  but  attributed  to  individuals  dis- 
tinct presentiments,  by  Divine  inspiration,  of  events  in  tlie  future. 
But  I  have  often  observed  that  upon  a  reluctant  or  doubting 
mind  the  argument  from  specific  predictions  either  makes  slight 
impression,  or  needs  to  be  preceded  by  another,  more  extended 
'  han  itself,  to  show  the  substantial  nature  of  its  grounds. 

Still  further :  an  argument  for  the  special  Divine  authorship 
)f  the  religion  of  the  JN'ew  Testament  may  be  properly  derived 
ii'om  the  evident  characteristics  of  the  book  itself :  the  vast  ex- 
/;ent,  and  sharp  distinctness,  of  its  affirjuative  propositions ;  the 
pureness  and  reach  of  its  ethical  system;  especially  from  the 
effortless  and  sovereign  perfection  of  the  portrait  which  it  pre- 
sents of  him  whom  it  glorifies  as  the  proper  Leader  and  Kin^^ 
of  the  world. 


24  EJTTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRI^TIANITT: 

As  compared  with  the  final  demonstration  of  experience,  thft 
argament  thus  suggested  may  also  be  classed  among  preliminary 
and  external  evidences ;  yet  I  confess  that  to  me,  with  my  ap- 
prehension of  the  scheme  and  the  scope  of  the  New  Testament, 
it  appears  of  a  positively  commanding  force,  almost  making 
unnecessary  any  other  form  of  preparatory  testimony. 

If  one  seriously  considers  the  philosophical,  theolo^cal,  ethi 
cal  structure  of  this  remarkable  book, — if  he  sets  it  clearly  amid 
its  times,  and  then  matches  against  it  the  Yedic  hymns,  the 
several  parts  of  the  Buddhistic  canon,  or  the  Sacred  Books  of 
China,  now  made  familiar  by  Dr.  Legge, — if  he  matches  against 
it  any  system,  philosophic  or  theosophic,  which  genius  has  con 
ceived,  and  which  human  patience  and  fervor  have  moulded,— 
it  seems  to  me  that  he  hardly  can  escape  a  serious,  intimate,  and 
enduring  conviction  that  something  beyond  a  peculiar  talent, 
in  a  young  and  eager  mechanic  of  Nazareth,  was  needed  to  frame 
it ;  that  the  Divine  Spirit  must  be  recognized  as  speaking, 
through  whatever  may  be  attributed  to  Jesus  of  intuition  and 
prudence,  in  this  illustrious  system. 

Preeminently,  as  I  said,  does  the  whole  exhibition  of  the 
Christ  in  these  Scriptures  seem  to  set  them  apart,  in  diversity  of 
nature,  from  all  other  writings,  unillu mined  by  them,  of  which 
human  minds  have  shown  themselves  capable.  Such  a  match- 
less  combination  of  power  with  gentleness,  of  lowliness  without 
abjectness,  and  supremacy  without  pride,  of  a  holiness  of  spirit 
so  native  and  complete  that  no  penitence  is  possible,  with  a 
sympathy  for  the  sinner  so  tender  and  profound  that  no  depth 
of  degradation  suffices  to  repel  it :  such  a  unique  and  incalculable 
career,  of  One  asserting  inherent  prerogatives  beside  which  the 
loftiest  imperial  claims  were  as  vanishing  sparks  beneath  the  un- 
fading splendor  of  suns,  yet  accepting  a  poverty  than  which  the 
peasant's  was  less  complete ;  of  One  able  to  control  all  powers 
of  nature  by  the  breath  of  his  lips,  yet  walking  for  years  in 
patience  and  in  pain,  amid  sneering  derisions,  and  tierce  opposi- 
tions, and  the  weakness  or  the  covetous  treachery  of  adherents, 
toward  victory  by  death,  and  the  conquest  of  the  world  by  what 
seemed  an  ignominious  subjection  to  its  force; — the  truth  of 
this  strange,  surpassing,  and  vital  picture,  seems  placed  almost 


ira  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  25 

beyond  dispute  by  its  very  existence !  Nor  does  it  seem  credible 
that  men  like  the  evangelists  should  have  conceived  it,  and 
flashed  it  on  immortal  pages,  without  having  not  only  seen  it 
but  felt  in  their  own  spirits  a  Divine  and  transforming  influx 
from  it,  of  wisdom  and  grace.  The  splendor  which  this  pict- 
ure has  cast  upon  history  almost  certifies  us  at  once  of  its  super- 
terrestrial  pureness  and  height. 

Yet,  no  doubt,  to  fully  set  forth  the  argument  thus  suggested, 
m  its  capital  force,  must  involve  a  patient  preceding  process  of 
analysis  and  of  synthesis,  to  show  what  is  the  astonishing  system 
of  doctrine  and  precept  in  the  New  Testament;  and  to  set  it  in 
comparison  with  other  philosophical  and  ethical  schemes.  It 
must  imply  a  searching  examination  of  the  ancient  documents, 
in  which  the  lineaments  of  the  Christ  are  portrayed ;  the  proof 
of  their  integrity ;  the  diligent  and  sufl&cient  exposition  of  their 
contents.  Without  these,  men  will  not  be  induced  to  accept  the 
asserted  supremacy  of  the  system  considered,  as  one  of  truth  and 
moral  order.  They  will  find  what  appear  to  them  parallels  to 
it,  in  other  schemes.  They  will,  very  likely,  attribute  to  its 
Founder  a  genius  for  religion  so  special  and  surpassing  that  he 
was  able,  without  sovereign  and  immanent  inspirations  from 
God,  to  write  his  name  above  the  stars.  They  may  possibly 
suspect,  indeed,  that  the  advancing  culture  of  the  world  has  im- 
perceptibly transported  into  Christianity  elements  of  a  later 
grace  and  renown ;  has  clothed  it  upon  with  spiritual  meanings, 
and  set  it  in  vast  cosmical  relations,  which  were  not  contem- 
plated by  evangelist  or  apostle,  or  by  him  from  whom  they 
both  had  learned.  They  may  even  conjecture  that  the  Lord 
himself  has  taken  a  glory  from  the  impassioned  Christian  im- 
agination of  subsequent  centuries,  instead  of  imparting,  as  his 
disciples  have  reverently  held,  all  its  essential  glory  to  that. 

It  appears  to  me  certain  that  such  doubts  will  disappear,  from 
the  more  candid  and  spiritual  minds,  as  they  follow  the  inquiries 
which  I  have  indicated ;  and  that  they  in  the  end  will  find  the 
New  Testament  standing  essentially  apart  from  and  above  all  other 
books,  in  the  doctrines  announced,  in  the  maxims  of  duty,  and  in 
the  majestic  and  untroubled  sweep  of  that  illumination  which  it 
at  least  professes  to  cast  over  Time  and  Eternity.   It  speaks  with 


26  EXTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR   CHRISTIANITY. 

ari  authority  more  native  and  complete  than  that  of  any  ordi 
nance  of  Senates.  There  is  no  detail  too  minute  for  its  scrutiny 
There  is  no  expanse  too  wide  for  its  survey.  It  comes  largely 
from  unlettered  men :  yet  on  all  superlative  spiritual  themes^ 
most  important  to  man,  it  speaks  in  a  voice  as  free  and  frank, 
while  as  lofty  in  tone,  as  any  voice  of  angels  in  the  air.  In  its 
outreach  and  majesty,  in  the  intimate  and  unstudied  concinnity 
of  each  part,  the  majestic  ultimate  coordination  of  all  into  a 
whole  which  educates  the  world — in  these,  as  well  as  in  the  still 
un approximated  conjunction  of  benignity  and  of  lordliness  in  the 
character  of  Him  whom  it  presents  for  our  homage  and  love — 
seems  radiant  evidence  that  it  was  not  born  in  the  wrenchino; 
throes  of  a  human  intelligence  ;  that  it  descended  out  of  heaven, 
from  God. 

But  to  furnish  the  premises  for  this  great  argument  would  be 
work  for  a  life-time.  So  this,  also,  we  will  pass  for  the  present^ 
with  only  such  general  reference  to  it. 

I  ask  myself  again  then :  Is  there  any  form  of  proof,  besides 
those  which  I  have  indicated,  besides  others  which  might  be- 
cited,  but  only  to  be  encountered  by  similar  objections — any 
form  of  proof  whose  probative  force  will  be  easily  and  naturally 
evident  to  all  who  are  thoughtful,  candid,  and  morally  sensitive^ 
and  which  will  at  least  make  it  probable  to  such  that  Christianity 
is,  in  a  supreme  sense,  a  religion  sent  from  God  to  the  world  ? 
will  make  it  so  probable  that  a  reflective  and  serious  person  will 
feel  himself  under  immediate  obligation  to  consider,  ponder, 
study  the  system,  and  to  make  that  personal  experiment  of  it 
which  it  always  appropriately  demands  ?  The  question  is  one  of 
controlUng  importance ;  and  I  seem  to  find  an  answer  to  it,  an 
affirmative  answer,  in  considering  the  indisputable  Historical 
Effects  which  have  followed  the  introduction  of  this  religion 
into  the  world;  which  follow  it  to-day,  wherever  the  system, 
having  before  been  unknown,  gets  itself  established  in  human 
acceptance,  and  assumes  control  over  persons  and  societies. 

Of  course,  as  I  have  fuUy  admitted,  much  evil,  and  that  oi 
gross  kinds,  has  been  connected  with  its  propagation.  But  this 
cannot  be  held,  even  by  its  opponents,  essential  to  it,  or  a  neces- 
sary fruit  of  its  normal  operation.     To  infer  its  character  from 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  27 

the  abuses  which  men  have  attached  to  it  would  be  to  repeat  the 
error  of  those  who,  according  to  the  fine  image  of  Deutsch,  in 
criticising  the  Talmud  have  '  mistaken  the  gargoyles,  the  grin- 
ning stone  caricatures  mounting  their  guard  over  cathedrals,  for 
the  gleaming  statues  of  Saints  within.'  *  Liberty  sometimes 
runs  to  license,  not  because  it  is  bad  in  itself,  but  because  human 
passion  perverts  its  principle.  Philanthropy  sometimes  makes 
men  crazy,  in  spirit  and  action,  if  not  in  mind;  not  because  the 
law  of  charity  is  in  itself  evil,  but  because  the  unconquered  heart 
of  man  makes  it  an  excuse  for  selfishness  or  ferocity.  If  Chnsti- 
anity  comes,  as  in  its  own  contemplation  it  does,  to  enlighten 
and  rectify  the  nature  of  mankind,  its  proper  effects  must  be 
wholly  separable,  in  thought  and  in  fact,  from  the  manifestations 
of  that  alien  and  insolent  human  temper  which  it  claims  at 
least  to  have  it  for  its  function  to  restrain  and  subdue.  If  we 
can  then  so  far  untwist  the  tangled  threads  interlacing  with  each 
other  in  the  tissue  of  history  as  to  extricate  what  is  peculiar  to 
Christianity  from  what  is  common  to  human  wickedness  or 
human  infirmity,  and  to  show  by  themselves  its  special  effects, 
then  these,  its  characteristic  products,  as  realized  in  the  public 
life  of  the  world,  may  give  us  light,  on  its  nature  not  only,  but 
on  its  origin  and  authority  over  men. 

"History,"  it  has  been  justly  said,  "is  no  Sphinx.  She  tells 
us  what  kind  of  teaching'  has  been  fruitful  in  blessino:  to  human- 
ity,  and  why,  and  what  has  been  a  mere  boastful  promise  or 
powerless  formula."  f  Systems  of  religion  springing  out  of  the 
limited  thought  of  man,  and  of  his  individual  purpose  and  plan, 
are  likely  to  be  local  rather  than  general  in  the  range  of  their 
influence ;  to  be  transient,  not  secular,  in  their  power  over  com- 
munities ;  to  be  even  substantially  egotistic  and  sterile,  leaving 
the  peoples  on  which  their  limited  forces  are  exerted  without 
rich  and  large  progress  inspired  by  them,  without  consequent 
wealth  and  resplendence  in  their  history.  It  may  properly  be 
expected  of  a  religion  coming  from  God  that  it  will  be  cosmical 
in  its  aims,  permanent  in  its  power,  and  that  it  will  put  alto- 


*  "Literary  Remains,"  New  York  ecL,  1874,  p.  4. 

t  "  Hours  with  the  Mystics,"  London  ed.,  1860,  Vol.  L,  p.  13. 


^  EJTEBNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CRRISTIANITT : 

gether  new  elements  into  human  society,  and  into  the  history 
^hich  portrays  that.  It  may  stir  great  commotions,  as  the  strong 
t)reeze  does  when  it*  strikes  down  upon  stagnant  lakes,  and 
-flings  the  offensive  sediment  to  the  surface.  But  it  must  be  that 
in  the  end  it  will  purify  and  refresh  what  it  turbulently  stirs, 
and  that  a  sweeter  and  nobler  life  will  be  in  communities  because 
of  its  coming.  In  the  absence  of  such  effects,  reported  miracles, 
it  seems  to  me,  however  extraordinary,  could  hardly  hold  to 
any  religion  the  faith  of  the  thoughtful.  In  the  presence  of  such 
effects,  the  likelihood  is  great,  to  state  the  fact  in  most  temperate 
phrase,  that  the  religion  by  which  they  are  wrought  has  come  to 
the  world,  not  from  man,  but  from  God. 

On  this  line  of  thought,  then,  I  ask  you  rapidly  but  attentively 
to  go  with  me,  in  the  Lectures  which  are  to  follow.  Of  course  it 
is  not  enough  for  me  to  show  that  the  world,  as  it  is,  is  better 
than  it  was,  a  dozen  or  twenty  centuries  ago  ;  or  even  that  it  has 
advanced  in  moral,  social,  and  personal  excellence,  most  surely 
and  rapidly  within  the  limits  of  what  we  call  Christendom.  All 
this  might  be  true,  and  still  the  progress  be  due  to  causes  out- 
side this  religion,  or  due  to  it  in  a  measure  without  proving  a 
special  divinity  to  belong  to  it.  I  have  not  the  slightest  wish  to 
strain  the  argument,  by  improperly  including  among  its  premises 
what  does  not  belong  there:  or  by  pressing  its  conclusions  a 
hair-breadth  further  than  they  ought  to  be  carried.  It  would 
seem  to  me  infidelity  to  the  Master  to  attempt  this.  I  remem- 
ber the  wise  maxim  of  Coleridge,  and  should  decline  to  enter  on 
such  an  effort  as  promptly  and  sharply  as  any  of  my  hearers. 
But  it  is  a  striking,  and,  within  obvious  limitations,  a  perfectly 
just  remark  of  Ewald,  made  certairdy  with  no  polemical  aim, 
that  religion  affects  peoples  even  more  potentially  than  it  does 
individuals :  that  is,  that  the  public  consciousness  of  religious 
obligation  is  frequently  more  pronounced  and  effective,  as  well 
as  more  enduring,  than  is  the  individual  conviction  of  it;  that 
religion  works  most  freely  and  fruitfully  through  the  social  or- 
ganism ;  and  that  the  public  development  may  reveal  its  pres- 
ence and  inspiration  where  they  are  hardly  as  clearly  discernible 
in  the  private  life  of  separate  souls. 

In  the  case  of  a  historical  religion  like  Christianity,  having 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORCE.  29- 

rules,  institutes,  ministries,  and  working  itself  into  tlie  general 
life  of  peoples,  this  raaj  be  expected  to  be  the  ease ;  and  if  it  be 
true,  as  I  think  it  to  be  true,  that  nations  have  been  widely  and 
beneficently  affected  by  it,  that  the  world  itself  is  practically 
another  world  in  moral  life  since  Jesus  of  Nazareth  taught  in 
it,  that  it  is  as  diverse  from  that  which  preceded  him,  whose  arts, 
industries,  philosophies,  social  systems,  prevailed  in  his  time,  as 
the  planet  would  be  if  another  earth  had  replaced  the  old  one, 
or  if  the  sun  had  first  shined  in  his  time  with  quickening  splen- 
dor on  meadow  and  hill — if  it  be  true,  as  surely  it  seems  to  me 
to  be  true,  that  this  change  dates  from  his  exact  epoch,  and  had 
its  vital  beginnings  in  him — then  it  appears  impossible  to  believe 
that  a  human  mind,  no  matter  how  gifted,  has  wrought  the 
change ;  that  any  genius,  or  any  will,  in  which  the  unsearchable 
Divine  energy  was  not  resident  and  enthroned,  has  produced  a 
transformation  so  immense  beyond  parallel.  The  world  of 
human  life  and  force  is  too  vast  for  any  man  to  master  and 
mould  it.  Society  is  too  continuous  and  organic  for  any  human 
spirit  to  work  in  it  so  enormous  a  change.  A  system  that  sud- 
denly swept  into  history  with  a  rush  of  beneficence  which  eight- 
een centuries  have  not  exhausted,  can  hardly  have  been  a  mere 
day-dream  of  Galilee.  I  find  no  adequate  account  of  it  possible 
which  does  not  ascribe  it  to  God  Himself. 

In  partially  indicating  some  of  the  principal  facts  in  history 
which  appear  to  me  to  illustrate  the  Divine  beneficence  and 
power  of  the  system  of  Christianity,  and  to  put  it  wholly  beyond 
comparison  with  any  fine  or  forcible  institutes  of  human  device, 
I  am  keenly  sensible  of  the  many  imperfections  which  must  mark 
my  treatment  of  such  a  theme :  but  I  shall  certainly  try  to  treat 
it  in  a  discerning  and  dispassionate  temper,  exaggerating  nothing, 
coloring  nothing,  concealing  nothing,  but  simply  and  fairly  setting 
forth,  for  myself  as  for  you,  what  has  been  accomplished  by  the 
special  force  of  this  religion  in  its  action  on  mankind.  Certainly 
one  who  exhibits  this  can  hardly  be  reckoned  among  those  of 
whom  it  has  been  sneeringly  said  that  they  argue  'from  their 
own  hearth-rug  upwari.'  It  is  a  realistic  form  of  evidence :  and 
one  which  meets  the  desire  of  men  for  something  recent,  not 
remote,  which  they  Kin  measure  and  test  lor  themselves.     I| 


30  EJTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR  CHRISTIANITF  : 

is  one,  too,  to  which  the  most  sceptical  historical  writers  maj 
not  reluctantly  contribute:  as  the  distinguished  historian  oi 
Rationalism  in  Europe,  to  take  a  single  iUustration,  has  clearly 
recognized  and  eloquently  set  forth  many  facts  important 
to  it,  while  himself  putting  miracles,  almost  with  a  sneer, 
upon  the  same  basis  with  fairy  tales.  It  is  a  method  of 
prooi  which  asks  no  preliminary  question  as  to  when,  or 
by  whom,  the  New  Testament  writings  were  prepared  or  col- 
lected, if  only  they  be  conceded  to  contain  Christianity.  The 
value  and  influence  of  the  Homeric  poems  would  not  be  obscured 
if  the  theory  of  Wolfe  and  Heyne,  elaborated  since,  as  well  aa 
controverted,  by  many  others,  should  be  generally  accepted,  that 
they  were  originally  separate  songs,  put  together  by  an  editor, 
perhaps  as  late  as  the  time  of  Peisistratus.  The  reign  of  Charle- 
magne would  not  cease  to  be  a  fact  of  cardinal  importance  in  the 
mediaeval  Europe  though  all  the  historical  records  of  his  career 
should  appear  upon  scrutiny  to  be  variously  imperfect.  And  if 
Christianity  has  left  of  itself  large  witness  in  history,  we  need 
not  begin  our  inquiry  about  it  with  investigating  the  documents 
in  which  it  was  early  proclaimed  to  the  world.  A  discussion  of 
these  may  properly  follow :  but  without  primary  reference  to 
them  it  may  appear,  from  the  nature,  the  permanence,  and  the 
beautiful  fruitfuluess  of  the  effects  of  the  religion  which  they 
present,  that  it  must  have  had  its  lofty  origin  in  the  mind  which 
is  Divine.  Then  we  may  expect  the  argument  to  grow  stronger, 
all  the  time,  as  society  advances — as  the  argument  derived  from 
ancient  miracles  hardly  can :  while  miracles  and  prophecies,  at- 
tending the  religion  at  its  first  introduction  to  the  knowledge 
of  the  world,  will  seem  scarcely  more  than  natural  aids  and  tit 
illustrations  given  it  by  its  Author,  and  any  sui-passing  and  ma- 
jestic sublimities  in  its  own  constitution  will  commend  them- 
selves to  us  as  germane  to  God's  Mind. 

The  personality  of  that  Mind  I  do  not  of  course  undertake  to 
prove,  since  I  am  speaking  not  to  or  for  atheists,  but  to  those 
who  already  believe  in  God ;  not  as  ^  a  generalized  expression  for 
natural  causes,'  but  as  the  Creator  and  Governor  of  the  Universe, 
who  is  in  Himself  eternal  Wisdom,  Goodness,  Truth.  That 
Buch  a  Being  can  give  a  system  of  religion,  by  revelation,  to 


ITS  PROBATIVE  FORGE.  31 

mankind,  no  one  of  us  certainly  will  deny.  Whether  He  has  in 
fact  done  so,  is  onr  question.  I  accept  fully  the  imperative  hy- 
pothesis that  if  He  has  done  it,  the  system  so  promulgated  must 
be  marked  by  His  character,  and  must  be  adapted  to  pnduce 
such  effects,  spiritual  and  social,  political,  ethical,  juridical  even, 
as  may  with  fairness  be  attributed  to  Him.  I  have  a  right,  on 
the  other  hand,  to  contend  that  if  the  effects  which  follow  the 
particular  scheme  of  Christianity  are  such  as  had  not  before  been 
produced  by  any  religious  or  ethical  system,  are  other  in  nature, 
higher  in  character,  more  extensive,  and  more  enduring,  and 
with  higher  prophecy  of  what  still  is  to  come — then,  in  propor- 
tion to  the  rareness  and  difficulty  of  these  special  effects,  will  rise 
the  probability  that  that  which  has  produced  them  has  proceeded 
from  God :  as  we  undoubtingly  ascribe  to  Him  the  sunshine 
which  blesses  the  earth  with  its  beauty,  or  the  sweet  and  or- 
derly succession  of  the  seasons,  marking  the  moments  on  the 
horologe  of  the  centuries.  I  cannot  be  mistaken  in  conceiving 
the  argument  worthy  of  attention,  whether  or  not  I  have  mis- 
conceived its  proper  force. 

As  I  said,  1  would  neither  exaggerate  nor  conceal.  I  admit,  at 
the  outset,  that  many  things  in  which  we  delight,  as  belonging 
distinctively  to  our  civilization,  have  come  through  those  not 
consciously  affected  by  Christian  faith,  and  sometimes  through 
those  who  strenuously  resisted  this  religion.  I  would  not  rob 
any  one  of  them  all — inventor,  writer,  captain  of  troops,  bold 
discoverer,  sagacious  statesman — of  the  honor  which  is  due  him. 
I  would  recognize  every  noble,  toiling,  victorious  man,  whether 
or  not  he  has  accepted  the  Master  of  the  new  ages.  It  is  not 
individual  action  for  which  I  am  to  look,  to  condone  or  condemn, 
or,  otherwise,  to  applaud ;  but  it  is  the  broad  general  effects 
which  seem  to  me  to  have  followed  Christianity,  springing  out 
of  it,  for  the  first  time  by  means  of  it  getting  themselves  real- 
ized and  established  in  society,  in  spite  of  all  contrary  tenden- 
cies in  mankind,  in  spite  of  the  resistance  of  all  the  institutions, 
habits,  laws,  which  had  before  them  to  be  dislodged.  If  we  find 
such,  on  a  large  scale,  going  everywhere  with  Christianity,  continu 
ing  through  the  centuries,  and  giving  promise  of  nobler  eras  yet 
to  come,  I  think  you  will  agree  that  it  is  not  rash  to  ^scribe  such 


32  EJTERNAL  EVIDENCE  FOR   CHRISTIANITY. 

efl'ects,  with  the  system  which  brings  them,  to  a  mind  above 
man's,  and  to  a  will  working  for  our  welfare,  in  comparison 
with  which  our  strongest  wills  are  of  wavering  weakness.  To 
this  inquiry  I  therefore  invite  you,  in  the  following  Lectures : 
and  may  He  who  is  surely  the  Author  of  the  soul,  whether  of  the 
outward  religion  or  not,  give  us  grace  to  discern  clearly  th« 
truth,  whatever  it  is,  and  to  be  its  prompt  and  glad  disciples  1 


LECTUEE    II 


THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD,   INTEODUCED  BIJ 
CHRISTIANITY. 


LECTUEE    II. 

That  a  new  and  nobler  conception  of  God  has  been  common 
nmong  men  since  Jesus  of  lN"azareth  proclaimed  his  religion,  it 
seems  quite  impossible  to  doubt;  and  that  such  change  and  ele- 
vation of  thought  on  this  supreme  theme  have  been  radically 
due  to  his  sovereign  instruction,  and  his  efficacious  and  undecay- 
ing  inlluefice,  appears  equally  evident.  But  certainly,  if  this  be 
admitted  as  ti-ue,  it  cannot  be  dismissed  as  of  trivial  importance. 
It  must  be  conceded  to  be  of  a  really  royal  significance. 

No  greater  intellectual  or  spiritual  gain  can  be  conceited  for 
a  man  than  that  which  is  implied  in  a  more  vivid,  just,  and  in- 
spiring conception  of  Him  from  whom  his  nature  came,  and 
with  whom  he  stands,  by  reason  of  that  nature,  in  essential  re- 
lations. No  object  can  be  conceived  more  worthy  the  aim  of  a 
Divine  revelation  than  to  give  men  precisely  this  uplift  and  ad- 
vancement in  the  knowledge  of  their  Creator.  It  has  to  do  with 
their  mental  progress,  in  power  and  in  culture.  It  is  intimately 
connected  with  the  training  of  conscience,  and  of  the  sweetest  and 
noblest  affections.  It  concerns  the  regulation,  and  the  tine  in- 
spiration, of  the  voluntary  force.  There  is  in  fact  no  element 
in  our  energetic  and  complex  nature  which  should  not  take 
beauty  and  blessing  upon  it  from  a  clearer  and  larger  apprehen- 
sion of  God.  As  the  tides  are  lifted  beneath  the  unseen  pull 
of  the  moon,  so  human  aspiration  must  be  exalted  when  the 
vision  of  the  infinite  Author  of  the  Universe  rises  above  it  in 
majestic  distinctness.  As  flowers  and  trees  respond  with  blooms 
brilliant  and  fragrant  to  the  kiss  of  the  sunshine  when  spring 
replaces  the  icy  winter,  so  whatever  is  noblest  in  man,  and  what- 
<€ver  is  most  delicate,  must  answer  the  appeal  of  a  radiant  dis- 
covery  of  that  presiding  Personal  Glory,  from  which  order  and 
life,  power  and  love,  incessantly  proceed 

(35) 


36  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD, 


Undoubtedly,  also,  whatever  noxious  forces  there  are  in  one's 
moral  nature,  of  rebellious  desire,  or  of  a  defiant  and  passionate 
will,  these  may  be  quickened  to  ranker  development,  or  stirred 
to  a  more  impetuous  swing,  by  such  a  revelation  ;  as  the  poison 
is  ripened,  no  less  than  the  rose,  by  the  play  of  the  sunlight ;  as 
the  storm  is  pushed  to  a  fury  more  destructive  by  the  force 
radiated  from  satellite  and  sun.  But  the  normal  effect  of  the  more 
ample  discovery  of  God,  on  the  finite  intelligence,  must  be  to 
exalt,  clarify,  and  ennoble  it.  And  so  men  have  always  sought 
for  this,  precisely  as  they  have  been  sensitive  and  reflective. 
They  who  have  missed  it  have  sadly  deplored  the  absence  of  it. 
They  who  have  had  it  have  felt  in  the  depth  of  their  responsive 
and  stimulated  being  that  no  other  privilege  was  so  august,  no 
other  knowledge  so  life-giving.  The  supreme  energy,  in  the 
sphere  of  moral  life,  in  Christendom  or  outside  it,  must  always 
be  this  which  descends  from  the  heights  of  the  creative  and 
kingly  Authority  which  resides  in  the  heavens. 

That  a  richer  impression  of  God  has  been  prevalent  and  illus- 
trious in  the  world,  since  Jesus  taught  in  it,  appears,  as  I  have 
said,  beyond  dispute ;  and  the  more  closely  we  examine,  in  its 
particulars,  this  essentially  new  conception  of  God,  the  more  pal- 
pable will  the  contrast  of  it  appear  with  whatever  preceded  it ; 
the  more,  it  seems  to  me,  shall  we  inwardly  feel  that  not  by 
human  means  alone — long  tried  before  without  success — but  by 
a  transcendent  Divine  revelation,  was  such  a  change,  so  intimate 
and  immense,  accomplished  for  man. 

No  thoughtful  person  will  speak  without  tenderness  of  any 
ancient  religious  scheme  which,  in  the  absence  of  ampler  light, 
has  drawn  to  itself  the  trust  and  hope  of  human  souls,  and  has 
been  their  means,  however  impei-fect,  for  ascending  to  nearer  in- 
tercourse with  God.  More  majestic  in  proportions,  more  sigiiif 
icant  often  in  particulars  of  detail,  than  any  renowned  architect- 
ure of  temples,  are  some  of  these  religions ;  more  pathetic  are 
they  than  any  tragedy,  when  we  really  touch  the  solemn  con- 
sciousness and  the  timid  aspiration  which  lie  beneath  them  ; 
musical  sometimes,  with  sad  deprecation  or  with  diffident  praise, 
beyond  the  melody  of  secular  poems ;  picturesque,  even,  with  a 
vivid  and  varied  beauty  surpassing  that  of  spectacular  pageants. 


INTRODUCED  BY  0HRI8TIANITY.  37 

As  simple  historical  monuments  they  appeal  to  a  profounder 
study  than  obelisks,  palaces,  or  civil  legislations.  As  systems 
illustrating  human  feeling,  they  touch  our  hearts.  We  may  never 
forget  that  souls  like  our  own  have  sung  their  hymns,  have 
builded  upon  them  their  tremulous  hopes,  have  left  them  baptized 
with  their  irrepressible  passionate  tears.  But  it  is  necessary 
carefully  to  trace  the  influence  of  such  religions,  pursuing  them 
to  their  effects  as  these  had  certainly  been  realized  in  society 
when  Jesus  came,  to  understand  the  work  accomplished  by  him, 
the  prodigious  revolution  which,  through  the  Christianity  that 
claims  him  for  its  Head,  has  in  this  direction  been  wrought  in 
the  earth. 

That  man  has  an  innate  sense  of  God, — implied  in  his  constant 
consciousness  of  dependence,  and  also  of  obligation,  both  point- 
ing to  a  Power  above  him,  and  in  his  vague  but  real  intuition  of 
an  Infinite  beyond  his  measurement  or  sight, — this  seems  demon- 
strably certain ;  almost,  in  fact,  an  axiom  in  religion.  The  old 
etymology  of  the  Greek  word  'Anthropos,'  whicli  made  it  rep- 
resent "  the  one  who  looks  upward,"  may  or  may  not  have  been 
the  correct  one ;  but  the  characteristic  mark  which  it  gives  ot 
the  human  person  is  justly  descriptive :  and  nothing  is  more  ap- 
parent in  history  than  the  search  which  man  has  made  after 
God,  in  all  places  and  times,  if  haply  he  might  find  Him.  The 
great  teachers,  the  Orphic  brotherhoods,  more  vaguely,  yet 
really,  the  common  multitudes,  have  alike  been  eager  in  this 
quest  for  the  Power  which  they  had  to  assume  as  the  ultimate 
source  of  order  and  of  life. 

The  fact  becomes  startling,  then,  that  so  many  of  the  thought- 
ful, in  the  days  which  remain  memorable  to  men  for  the  mission 
of  Jesus,  had  become  wholly  and  frankly  atheistic,  or  had  come 
to  recognize  no  other  God  than  the  universe  itself,  which  to 
them  was  the  impersonal  source,  and  the  ultimate  reservoir,  of 
existence  and  energy.  It  is  only  to  be  explained  by  their 
vehement  recoil  from  the  rites  of  worship,  immoral  and  debasing, 
which  were  practiced  around  them,  and  from  the  fictions  of  his- 
torical tradition  which  bore  these  as  their  appropriate  poisonous 
fruit.  How  immoral  and  how  debasing  these  rites  had  become, 
I  need  hardly  remind  you.     There  had  been  points,  in  the  ex. 


^8  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD, 

perience  of  various  peoples,  where  natural  religion  seemed  nearly 
if  not  wholly,  to  touch  the  level  of  revelation  ;  where  the  primi* 
tive  conception  of  God  had  been  so  comparatively  worthy  and 
high  that  the  subsequent  descent  from  it  appears  almost  incred- 
ible: the  monotheism  being  lost  so  utterly  in  the  multitude  of 
divinities;  the  adoration  of  contemplation,  or  the  solemn  ane.estral 
ritual  of  sacrifice,  giving  place  so  completely  to  frivolous,  licen- 
tious, or  obscene  customs  of  what  was  called  worship.  But 
these  customs  were  now  so  established  that  only  a  radical  and 
world-wide  revolution  of  thought  and  feeling  could  displace 
them.  Cicero,  and  Seneca,  with  many  others,  recognized  and 
rebuked  the  tendency  of  men,  instead  of  bringing  the  Divine  ta 
the  human,  to  attribute  their  own  sins  to  the  gods:  till  such 
were  encouraged,  and  seemed  authorized,  from  on  high.  The 
testimony  of  Herodotus,  Strabo,  and  others,  as  to  the  infamous 
usages  of  worship  in  Babylon  and  in  Egypt,  is  sufficiently 
familiar.  The  voluntary  sacrifice  of  virtue  by  woman  was  ac- 
cepted as  an  offering  dear  to  the  gods ;  and  a  sensuality  so  fright 
ful  that  Christendom  could  not  bear  its  story,  if  the  veil  of  the- 
ancient  language  were  lifted,  had  become  part  of  the  ritual  of 
religion  on  the  Nile  and  the  Euphrates. 

It  was  said  of  the  Greeks  by  Apuleius  that  they  differed  from- 
the  Egyptians  in  that  they  honored  their  gods  by  dances,  which 
the  Egyptians  replaced  with  lamentations.  The  lighter  and  more 
<^ancif  ul  spirit  of  the  Greek  is  suggested  by  the  remark.  But  in 
one  respect  they  were  certainly  alike,  in  their  readiness  to  instal 
the  animal  lusts  among  services  of  religion:  so  that  Strabo 
tells  us,  you  remember,  that  the  wealth  of  Corinth  proceeded 
largely  from  the  foul  hire  of  prostitution  in  the  temples ;  and 
Athengeus  records  that  to  the  prayers  of  the  temple-courtesans, 
as  well  as  to  the  valor  of  the  heroes  of  Marathon,  the  Corinthi. 
ans  ascribed  the  great  Persian  repulse.  Even  statues  of  sucb- 
courtesans  had  honored  and  eminent  place  in  the  temples. 
Gibbon  himself— who  looked  at  whatever  was  not  Christianity 
with  passionless  and  discerning  eyes — has  given  the  world  in  hi? 
Twenty-third  chapter  a  slight  but  a  fearfully  significant  sketch 
of  the  license  in  worship  which  prevailed  in  Antioch :  where 
pleasure,  as   he   says,  assumed  the  character  of   religion,  and 


INTROBUOED  BY  0HRI8TIANITT,  39 

where  "the  lively  licentiousness  of  the  Greeks  was  blended 
with  the  hereditary  softness  of  the  Syrians."  * 

In  Koman  worship,  as  publicly  practiced,  an  equal  licentious- 
ness was  not  unknown.  The  Roman  nature  was  haughty  and 
restrained.  For  a  hundred  and  seventy  years  after  the  city  wa3 
founded  the  gods  had  been  worshipped  without  statues ;  and  re- 
ligion,  with  that  conquering  and  political  people,  was  always  a  vast 
and  elaborate  public  art,  by  which  to  compel  the  services  of  the 
gods  on  behalf  of  the  city.  Yet  Ovid  and  Juvenal  set  pictures 
before  us  of  fearful  significance ;  and  Seneca  complained  that  men 
uttered  the  most  abominable  prayers  in  the  ears  of  the  gods,  so 
that  what  a  man  ought  not  to  hear  they  did  not  blush  to  speak  to 
the  Deity :  while  to  the  general  mxdtitude  of  worshippers  he  at- 
tributed indecency,  and  virtual  insanity,  adding  that  only  the 
number  of  such  secured  for  them  the  reputation  of  reason.  Ml 
gods  had  come  to  be  recognized  as  local.  The  oracle  at  Delphi 
had  authorized  the  maxim  that  the  best  religion  was  that  of  a 
man's  own  city.  The  noblest  of  the  divinities  were  not  imagined 
to  take  any  interest  in  human  virtue.  The  most  popular  stories 
current  about  them  were  the  frightful  and  depraving  legends 
which  rehearsed  their  furious  passions  and  amours.  The  Chris- 
tian Fathers,  in  their  most  passionate  appeals  against  idol- worship, 
had  only  to  repeat  what  was  commonly  accepted  in  the  popular 
notion.  Indeed,  the  most  dismal  superstitions  were  coming  to 
take  the  place  of  any  semblance  of  faith :  as  Tiberius  put  his 
trust  in  laurel-leaves  to  protect  him  from  lightning ;  as  the  Em- 
peror Nero,  Uhlhorn  reminds  us,  ^  having  become  tired  of  the 
goddess  Astarte,  worshipped  no  longer  any  god,  but  an  amulet 
which  had  been  given  him — ^the  ruler  of  the  world  becoming 
the  devotee  of  a  fetish.'  f 

In  this  terrific  condition  of  things,  three  controlling  tendencies 
appeared,  each  of  which  we  must  recognize  to  bring  before  us 
the  fearful  arena  into  which  the  new  force  of  Christianity  entered. 
The  first  is,  the  increasing  atheistic  or  pantheistic  unbelief  of 


*  ''Decline  and  Fall,  etc.,"  London  ed.,  1848,  Vol.  IH.,  pp.  175-7, 196. 
t**  Conflict  of  Christianity  with   Heathenism,"   New  York  ed.,  1879, 
p.  63. 


40  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  QOD, 

philosophers  in  any  personal  God  at  all — in  any  God,  except  an 
indefinite  principle  of  order,  or  a  lambent  lire-BOul  of  the  uni- 
verse. The  sad  words  of  the  elder  Pliny  have  been  often  re- 
f erred  to,  in  which  he  utters  his  blinding  doubt  whether  there 
be  any  God  at  all,  distinct  from  the  world  or  the  sun — and 
counts  it  at  any  rate  a  foolish  delusion  to  suppose  that  such 
an  infinite  Spirit,  if  there  be  one,  would  concern  himself  with 
the  affairs  of  men.  It  is  difficult  to  say,  he  thinks,  whether 
it  were  not  better  for  men  to  be  wholly  without  a  religion  than 
to  have  one  of  this  kind.  He  concludes  with  the  lament  that 
nothing  is  certain  save  the  absence  of  certainty.  He  speaks  re- 
spectfully of  the  opinion  then  beginning  to  prevail,  which  at- 
tributes events  to  the  influence  of  the  stars;  and  he  breaks  into 
the  passionate  saying  that  the  best  thing  bestowed  upon  man  ia 
the  power  to  take  his  own  life. 

So  Varro  is  reported  to  have  held  that  the  only  thing  true  in 
religion  is  the  idea  of  a  soul  of  the  world,  by  which  all  things  are 
moved  and  governed ;  and  Seneca  speaks,  as  quoted  by  Augus- 
tine, of  that  ignoble  crowd  of  gods  which  the  superstition  of 
ages  has  collected,  in  the  worship  of  whom  the  wise  man  will 
join  only  as  remembering  that  it  is  matter  of  custom,  not  due  to 
reality,  as  commanded  by  the  laws,  not  as  pleasing  to  the  gods. 
The  Epicureans,  represented  by  Lucretius,  practically  denied  all 
gods,  made  the  outward  world  and  the  soul  of  man  the  necessary 
result  of  a  play  of  atoms,  and  esteemed  it  the  chief  end  of  phi- 
losophy to  banish  as  illusory,  or  brand  as  fictitious,  all  forms  of 
religious  belief. 

The  Stoical  school,  whose  original  teachings  show  so  much  of 
the  semblance  of  Hebrew  conceptions  as  almost  to  justify  the 
suspicion  of  many  that  Zeno  and  Cleanthes  had  learned  what 
was  written  in  the  Law  and  the  Prophets, — this  had  become,  if 
it  were  not  at  the  outset,  essentially  pantheistic.  Traces  of  this 
meet  us  plainly  in  Seneca ;  and  a  scornful  Pyrrhonism  appeared 
the  only  philosophical  refuge  from  atheism  on  the  one  hand  or 
pantheism  on  the  other.  Even  Plato — who,  according  to  Justin 
Maityr,  had  learned  of  the  Hebrew  faith  in  Egypt — had  said  in 
the  Timaeus  that  it  was  hard  to  find  the  Creator  of  the  Universe^ 
and  that  when  he  was  found  it  would  hardly  be  possible  to  make 


INTROBTJCEI)  BY  CHRmTIANITY.  41 

hiin  evident  to  all ;  and  the  aristocratic  tendency  of  the  ancient 
philosophy,  represented  in  the  remark,  made  such  conceptions 
of  any  unseen  supernal  unity  as  philosophers  might  attain  with- 
out effect  on  the  general  mind.  All  such  speculations,  to  the 
common  understanding,  were,  as  the  sneering  Caligula  said  of 
Seneca's  eloquence,  *  sand  without  lime.'  When  Cicero,  there- 
fore, wrote  his  Scipio's  Dream,  or  Seneca  his  ]^atural  Questions,, 
when  Strabo  said — imposing  his  own  thought  upon  Moses^ 
that  the  one  highest  Being  is  that  which  we  call  heaven,  the 
universe,  and  the  nature  of  things,  when  Marcus  Aurelius  long 
afterward  said,  but  in  the  same  spirit,  *  the  man  of  instructed 
and  modest  mind  says  obediently  to  J^ature,  who  gives  all  and 
takes  it  again.  Give  what  thou  wilt,  and  take  back  what  thou 
wilt,'*  or  when  Plotinus,  the  Neo-Platonist  apostle,  said  in  dying 
that  he  '  should  try  to  convey  back  the  divine  in  man  to  the 
divine  in  the  universe  'f — there  was  nothing  in  all  this  to  make 
the  impression  of  a  vital  Divine  Unity  on  the  popular  mind.  The 
conception  of  that  had  no  distinct  hold  on  the  thoughts  even  of 
philosophers;  and  they  were  almost  as  distinctly  atheistic — if 
theism  imply  faith  in  a  creative  Person — as  had  been  the  religion 
of  Buddha  at  the  outset,  or  the  ethical  instruction  of  Confucius. 
A  primitive  monotheism,  general  in  the  world,  is  indicated  as 
probable  by  many  facts :  among  Romans,  Greeks,  Orientals,  Hin- 
dus, the  earliest  inhabitants  of  Egypt  or  of  China.  But  it  had 
certainly  come  to  pass  in  the  day  when  Christianity  broke  upon 
the  empire  that  the  world  by  wisdom  knew  not  God.  What 
Duncker  says  of  Brahman  might  have  been  said  of  the  very 
highest  conception  of  God  then  obtaining  among  the  thoughtful  r 
it  was  "a  soul-less  World-soul"  which  they  recognized.:]:  Light- 
foot  has  tersely  expressed  the  fact,  when,  after  a  large  and  candid 
summary  of  the  maxims  of  Stoicism  and  of  its  principles,  he 
says  in  his  Commentary  on  the  Letter  to  the  Philippians,  '*  The 
Buprome  God  of  the  Stoics  had  no  existence,  distinct  from  ex- 
ternal nature."  §     This  was  true ;  and  the  thin  veil  of  mysti- 


**'Meditations,"X.  14. 

•|  Neander's  " History  of  the  Church"  :  Boston  ed.,  1851 :  Vol.  I.,  p.  31; 

I  "History  of  Antiquity,"  IV.,  546.  §  p.  294. 


42  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  QOD^ 

cism  here  and  there  thrown  over  tlie  stonj  system  does  not  di». 
guise  its  essentially  cold  and  hard  materialism. 

With  this  tendency  in  the  philosophical  minds  was  simul- 
taneously shown  a  wide  and  swift  decay  of  faith  concerning 
the  gods  among  the  people,  especially  in  the  cities ;  so  that  the 
ancient  rites  of  worship  became  objects  of  public  sarcasm ;  so 
that  Horace  describes  the  manufacture  of  a  god  in  a  style  as  con- 
temptuous as  that  of  Isaiah  or  Jeremiah ;  so  that  Froude,  it 
would  seem,  hardly  exaggerates  when  he  says  that  in  the  time 
of  Caesar  '  the  Roman  people  had  ceased  to  believe :  the  spiritnal 
quality  was  gone  out  of  theni :  and  the  higher  society  of  Kome 
was  simply  one  of  powerful  animals.'  *  A  certain  apprehension 
that  there  might  be  Powers,  unseen  yet  near,  whom  it  was  at 
least  not  safe  to  offend,  still  kept  men  to  the  performance  of 
some  rites  of  religion.  But  Livy — writing  at  about  the  time  of 
the  Lord's  advent — complained  of  that  neglect  of  the  gods  which 
even  then  widely  prevailed.  The  tendency  in  later  times  only 
increased.  The  constant  introduction  of  new  gods  into  E-ome 
from  Egypt  and  the  East,  the  portentous  syncretism  which  filled 
the  pantheon  with  a  promiscuous  crowd  of  divinities  from  all 
the  earth,  show  how  lightly  the  old  ones  had  come  to  be  regarded  ; 
while  in  Greece — where  Aristophanes,  conservative  as  he  was, 
had  burlesqued  the  gods  with  riotous  ridicule — at  the  celebration  of 
the  Eleusinian  mysteries  the  religious  processions  were  greeted  by 
the  populace  with  mocking  gibes.  It  may  perhaps  with  reason 
oe  doubted  whether  the  vehement  satire  of  Juvenal  is  to  be 
^aken  as  representing  exact  lines  of  historical  truth;  whether 
the  temper  of  the  man,  and  his  pessimistic  tendencies,  have  not 
surcharged  with  lurid  tints  his  picture  of  the  times.  But  there 
can  hardly  be  room  for  doubt  that  he  at  least  approximated  the 
truth  when  he  said  that  even  children  had  ceased  to  believe 
anything  about  the  under-world,  and  that  the  priests  of  august 
temples  could  commonly  be  found  in  corner-taverns,  among  sail- 
ors and  slaves.  Indestructible  instincts  in  the  soul  would  not 
allow  nations  to  become  atheistic ;  but  the  deified  Virtues  of  the 
early  Romans — Yalor,  Truth,  Clemency,  Concord — ^had  ceased  to 


*  "Csesar":  New  York  ed.,  1879:  p.  18. 


INTRODVGEB  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  43 

attract  the  later  worship  ;  and  the  multitude  of  new  gods,  jostling 
each  other  in  their  appeals  to  the  popular  fancy,  could  only  excite 
v\  the  morally  sensitive  a  passionate  disgust.  Cicero,  you  re- 
member, in  one  of  his  most  famous  treatises,  represents  the  ac- 
complished and  honorable  Pontifex  as  sneeringly  repelling  all 
arguments  for  gods,  or  for  Providence,  while  upholding  the  ex- 
pediency of  the  established  public  rites. 

Here,  then,  appears  the  third  tendency — in  some  respects  more 
startling  in  itself,  and  more  threatening  in  its  prophecies,  than 
either  of  the  others — to  the  deification  of  Roman  emperors,  even 
during  their  life,  and  in  spite  of  the  utmost  ferocity,  seusualit3\ 
or  intolerable  folly,  manifest  in  them.  This  had  its -chief  cur- 
rency in  the  provinces,  no  doubt,  but  at  the  capital  it  was  au- 
thorized and  maintained.  A  tendency  to  it  had  crept  into  Rome 
from  conquered  and  tributary  Oriental  countries,  where  deified 
men  had  long  been  adored ;  but  its  rapid  development  shows 
how  thoroughly  the  old  faith  had  fallen  into  decay.  Here,  at 
least,  was  a  recognized  power  :  a  power  unlimited,  over  property 
and  life.  There  was  that  one  affirmative  fact,  amid  the  whirl  of 
departing  beliefs  and  bewildering  doubts ;  so  that  not  unnatu- 
rally miraculous  stories  sprang  up  about  Caesar,  or  abput  Augus- 
tus ;  and  the  latter  was  deified  by  decree  of  the  Senate,  as  the 
former  had  been  apotheosized  by  the  people.  This  came  to  be 
the  only  general  worship  known  in  the  empire.  In  Spain,  Afri- 
ca, Gaul,  Greece,  in  Palestine  and  in  Egypt,  were  temples,  im- 
ages, and  the  offerings  of  this  worship.  Festivals  and  games 
were  associated  with  it.  Fraternities  of  those  devoted  to  its 
celebration  were  widely  established ;  cities  coveted  the  name 
*  servants  of  the  temple  of  the  Caesar-God ':  and  of  even  the 
Jew  it  was  inexorably  required  that  he  should  offer  an  hom- 
age to  the  emperor,  by  perpetual  public  sacrifices,  such  as  he 
offered  to  no  other  person.  To  refuse  this  homage  was  practi- 
cally the  "crimen  laesae  magistatis";  and  this,  though  Seneca 
could  satirize  bitterly  the  deification  of  Claudius — dying  of  med- 
icated mushrooms  —  whon'  he  had  recently  extolled  as  a  god ; 
though  Nero's  daughter,  ot  four  months  old,  had  been  made  a 
goddess;  though  it  must  ha\e  been  felt,  about  many  of  the  em- 
perors, that  if  they  were  go«'s,  then  devils  had  taken  Divina 


14  THE  NEW  GONCEPTrON  OF  GOD, 

pierogatives;  though  the  rough  and  ready  Yespasian  could  snoot 
at  the  thought  of  becoming  a  divinity,  in  his  last  sickness ;  and 
though,  at  a  subsequent  time,  the  frightful  Elegabalus  solemnly 
Installed  the  black  conical  aerolite  of  Emesa  as  sovereign  of  all 
2;ods,  on  the  Palatine  mount. 

/,  It  was  into  this  world,  so  dim  and  uncertain  in  either  the  pop- 
ular or  the  philosophic  conception  of  God,  so  bewildered  and 
baffled  between  polytheism  and  pantheism,  so  fallen  from  the 
monotheistic  idea  which  had  probably  had  supremacy  in  an 
earlier  time,  so  unbelieving  concerning  the  gods  whom  its  ances- 
tors had  worshipped,  so  certain  at  last  of  only  one  thing  in  the 
sphere  of  religion — that  the  emperor  had  an  awful  power ;  that 
whatever  his  vices  he  could  be  no  worse  than  Jupiter  had  been, 
or  any  one  of  a  score  of  gods ;  and  that  if  the  Senate  decreed 
worship  to  him,  then  worship  he  should  have,  as  a  matter  of 
patriotism  and  public  order,  if  not  as  a  matter  of  personal  con- 
viction—  it  was  into  this  world,  stumbling  amid  such  fetid 
daikness,  that  Christianity  came:  and  the  doctrine  which  it 
uiMie  speedily  controlling,  and  finally  universal,  concerning  God, 
NRS  certainly  in  the  most  absolute  contrast  with  what  had 
-preceded ;  .the  effect  which  it  accomplished  can  hardly  be  exag- 

\  i,7jrated,  in  its  spiritual  significance,  or  its  secular  importance. 
It  had  of  course  to  put  at  instant  defiance  that  worship  of 
llo  emperor  which  was  the  terrible  final  fruit  of  the  rotting 
iiuathenisni  which  it  overshadowed ;  and  in  that  tremendous 
'jontest  it  was  that  multitudes  of  Christians  were  tortured,  burn- 
»^.d,  sold  as  slaves,  or  flung  to  wild  beasts.  But  it  had  as  well, 
xhis  new  Christianity,  by  spiritual  force  to  combat  and  conquer 
I  ha  polytheistic  or  pantheistic  schemes  of  the  universe  ;  to  present 
\o  men  another  portrait  of  God  ;  and  to  establish  toward  Him  a 
'uving  belief,  in  place  of  the  sad  or  cynical  incredulity  with 
vvhich  the  very  idea  of  the  Divine  had  come  to  be  regarded.  It 
^as  a  vast  work :  how  vast  may  be  inferred  from  the  utter  failure 
of  men  like  Plutarch,  like  Epictetus,  or  like  Marcus  Aurelius 
afterward,  with  all  their  earnestness,  all  their  power  of  ample 
and  persuasive  statement,  and  all  their  hold  on  the  popular  re- 
spect, to  do  anything  whatever,  wide  or  enduring,  toward  giving 
men  a  better  knowledge  of  God.     They  wrote  or  spoke  in  the 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY,  45 

interest  of  the  ancient  systems,  though  they  came  after  Chris, 
tianity  was  declared,  and  when  a  subtile  influence  from  it  acted 
perhaps  imperceptibly  on  themselves,  was  certainly  beginning  to 
act  on  the  empire.  Yet  Plutarch,  or  the  disciples  who  folio wo«l 
liiin,  could  work  no  moral  improvement  in  society  ;  and  Plutarcli 
could  only  denounce  superstition  as  worse  than  atheism,  because 
more  positive  in  its  effects,  and  try  to  show  a  reasonable  basis 
beneath  the  figures  of  the  pagan  mythology.  In  some  aspects 
of  his  thought,  as  in  many  of  his  life,  one  cannot  consider  him 
without  admiration ;  but  he  must  have  felt  that  all  his  efforts 
were  essentially  vain,  while  he  wholly  failed  to  recognize  the 
fact  that  a  new  light  was  rising  on  the  world,  that  a  new  force 
was  descending  into  it,  by  which  should  be  accomplished  more 
than  all  for  which  he  idly  and  sadly  strove. 

In  considering  what  Christianity  did,  in  this  superlative  de-  \ 
partment  of  thought,  we  are  to  remember  that  it  was  not  in  all 
things  a  novel  system,  without  hold  on  the  Past,  or  an  organic 
connection  with  that.  It  had,  on  the  other  hand,  immense  and 
vital  historical  connections:  it  was  so  divine,  as  Pascal  observed, 
that  another  divine  religion  was  only  its  foundation  :*  and  in  its 
discovery  of  God  to  the  world  it  simply  absorbed  into  itself  all 
the  virtue  of  that  preceding  and  preparatory  system  which  had 
led  the  way  to  it ;  it  poured  a  nobler  illustration  upon  that ;  it 
added  to  what  had  been  in  that,  other  elements  of  supreme  im- 
portance; and  when  it  had  thus  given  it  consummation — a  sud- 
den, strange,  transcendent  consummation — it  gave  it  also  a  swift 
iind  amazing  universality.  This  is  the  office  which  Christianity 
accomplished,  in  instructing  mankind  as  to  Him  who  is  above. 
Observe,  then,  how  unique,  how  imperative,  how  ultimate,  is 
the  word  which  it  utters  concerning  God  :  the  fixed  and  final 
conception  of  Him  which  it  has  made  familiar  and  controlling 
wherever  its  astonishing  energy  has  been  felt.  / 

That  it  ascribes  to  Him  absolute  Personality,  I  need  not  say : 
that  it  never,  for  a  moment,  confounds  Him  with  the  universe, 
or  conceives  Him  as  the  animating  but  impersonal  soul  of  the 
■earth  and  the  heavens.     The  ethnic  worshipper,  untaught  by 


*  " Pens^es  " ;  Sec.  Far;  Art.  IV   12 ;   Vrt.  XVII.  9. 


/ 


46  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  QOD, 

philosophy,  had  apprehensively  suspected  a  hidden  Will  behind 
the  various  palpable  phenomena  of  wind  and  stream,  of  star  oi 
storm.  The  idol  now,  in  the  heathen  temple,  however  gro- 
tesque and  appalling  to  the  sight,  or  however  decked  with  rai- 
ment of  gold  and  shining  stones,  is  not  worshipped  for  itself,  but 
for  the  secret  and  awful  presence  which  is  supposed  to  lurk  be- 
hind it,  to  be  watchfully  present  in  the  uncouth  outlines  of  limb 
and  arm,  and  thence  to  be  able  to  threaten  men.  The  moment 
the  mind,  advancing  in  discerning  and  critical  power,  began  to 
carefully  reflect  upon  this,  its  folly  was  apparent :  and  so,  with 
reaction  from  the  common  idolatry,  came  the  loss  of  the  sense  of 
personality  in  God,  the  substitution  of  Nature  or  E^ate  in  place  of 
the  idol.  Indeed,  tendencies  to  a  logical  or  poetical  pantheism  are 
always  active  in  the  world,  and  have  by  no  means  been  unknown 
in  our  own  time. 

The  Christian  Faith,  like  the  Hebrew  which  it  consummates, 
refuses  any  image  of  God ;  it  looks  upon  all  such  as  paltry  and 
blasphemous ;  and  it  has  been  often  energetically  denounced  for 
what  was  esteemed  the  ruthless  violence  with  which  it  has 
turned  the  noblest  statues,  purporting  to  outline  the  Infinite 

I  Majesty,  into  lime  and  dust.  But  the  sense  of  the  perfect  Divine 
personality  is  in  it  more  intense  than  it  ever  had  been  in  the 
simplest  idolater.  The  Hebrew  hymns,  from  first  to  last,  had 
been  vocal  with  this.  The  whole  historic  Hebrew  legislation 
had  throbbed  with  this  pervading  thought.  So  vivid  had  been 
the  conception  of  it  in  prophet  and  singer  that  they  had  gone  to 
the  edge,  at  least,  of  anthropomorphic  pictures  of  God,  to  show 
that  as  the  architect  is  different  from  the  house,  the  governor 
from  his  kingdom,  the  psalmist  from  his  harp,  so  God  is  distinct 
from  His  creation  ;  and  that  as  man  has  intelligence,  conscience, 
the  power  of  choice,  the  capacity  for  affection,  so  God  contains 
within  Himself,  in  His  sovereign  life,  all  elements  and  attributes 
of  a  perfect  personality.  Whatever  else  is  true  or  not  of  the 
Hebrew  Faith,  this  certainly  is. 


There  is  no  touch  or  trace  in  Christianity  of  anything  inju- 
riously anthropomorphic  in  its  supplemental  disclosure  of  God. 
He  is  a  Spirit,  to  be  worshipped  only  in  spirit  and  in  truth.  But 
that  conception  of  His  personality  which  it  forced  upon  all  wlm 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRIJSTIANITY.  4^7 

heard  it  in  the  world  is  as  vital,  universal,  and  as  sharp  in  its 
impression,  as  if  this  had  been  the  only  lesson  which  it  was  given 
to  it  to  bring.  Against  all  philosophical  speculation  which 
would  challenge  or  cloud  this,  against  all  governing  preference  f oi 
a  univei-so  with  no  supreme  Person  at  its  head,  it  sets  this  fortl) 
in  resplendent  exhibition.  Its  doctrine  of  Man,  as  a  person  bo 
fore  God,  is  not  a  whit  more  definite  and  complete  than  its  doctrine 
of  God  as  a  Person  above  him.  / 

To  this  it  adds  a  doctrine  of  His  Unity,  in  both  Old  and  New 
Testaments,  only  the  dim  foreshadowing  of  which  had  even 
Plato  or  Xenophanes  caught,  and  from  which  the  mind  of  the 
world  at  large  had  seemed  hopelessly  estranged.  Monotheism  is 
believed  by  many,  as  I  have  intimated,  to  have  had  original 
prevalence  on  the  earth,  among  other  peoples  as  well  as  the 
Semitic,  and  only  gradually  to  have  lost  its  supremacy.  But 
how  utterly  it  had  passed  from  the  noblest  ethnic  religions,  in 
the  day  when  Jesus  appeared  on  the  earth,  no  student  of  history 
needs  to  be  told.  Though  recognized  possibly  in  the  early  Per- 
sian faith,  it  certainly  was  not  by  those  who  succeeded  to  the  in- 
heritance of  that,  with  whom  the  dualism,  which  seductively 
promises  to  solve  problems  of  the  universe,  became  the  estab- 
lished norm  of  religious  thought.  If  the  Indian  people  once 
recognized  and  revered  one  multiform  Power  behind  the  visible 
]3henomena  of  the  world,  even  in  the  Yedic  hymns  the  three  de- 
partments of  earth,  air,  and  heaven,  were  already  assigned  to 
separate  divinities ;  and  there  appear  among  them  the  gods  of 
Fire,  Tempest,  the  Sky,  the  Ocean,  and  the  Dawn,  with  the 
Adityas,  with  Yishnu,  ^iva,  Pushan,  and  the  rest :  while  under 
the  influence  of  that  ancient  religion,  to  which  he  clings  with 
patient  tenacity,  the  Hindu  has  come  in  later  time  to  worship 
his  three  hundred  millions  of  gods.  It  is  said  by  those  familiar 
with  them  that  the  ancient  hymns  at  least  admit  the  doubt 
whether  man  was  not  originally  esteemed  a  part  of  Divinity. 

How  utterly,  even  frightfully,  the  thought  of  God's  oneness 
liad  passed  out  from  the  popular  mind,  in  Egypt,  Syria,  Greece,    '^ 
Kome,  has   already  been  suggested.     The   tendency  had   been 
constant,  unreturning,  to  crowd  the  earth  and  people  the  sky 
•with  subordinate  gods,  to  whom  prayer  was  offered  and  tribute 


^  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  QOD, 

brought ;  who  were  simply,  as  Heraclitus  said,  *  immortal  men/ 
yet  no  one  of  whom  could  be  conciliated  without  service,  or  of- 
fended without  danger.  This  seems  to  i-epresent  a  law  of  human 
nature,  the  operation  of  which  has  not  been  unknown  iu  Christen- 
dom itself.  Outside  the  special  Jewish  people,  often  indeed 
within  that,  it  wrought  in  antiquity  with  a  subtle  and  over- 
whelming power.  It  was  not  as  malaria  rising  from  swamps, 
and  isolated  basins.  It  was  an  impalpable  spiritual  poison,  which 
infected  the  entire  air  of  the  earth. 

Under  the  teaching  of  Christianity,  in  both  its  earlier  and  its 
later  stages — when  Law  and  Promise  were  preparing  the  way  for 
it,  and  when  it  came  to  complete  exhibition — tlie  doctrine  of 
God's  oneness,  I  need  not  say,  is  imperative,  universal.  AVhat 
had  been  the  occasional  thought  of  rare  and  high  minds,  which 
transcended  their  time,  and  which  caught  uncertain  glimpses  of 
this  truth,  as  Pythagoras  did  of  the  unity  of  the  universe  in  its 
revolving  spheres,  but  which  were  not  able  to  hold  clearly  for 
themselves  the  high  speculation,  much  less  to  make  it  a  law  and 
an  impulse  to  the  general  mind — that,  since  Jesus,  is  an  axiom 
in  religion.  Roman,  Greek,  German,  Sclavonian,  for  each  and 
all  the  pantheon  has  been  emptied ;  and  the  moment  the  new 
Faith  burst  upon  them,  one  God  was  recognized,  lord  of  winds 
and  seas  and  stars,  author  alike  of  day  and  night,  pain  and  pleas- 
ure, life  and  death.  Those  who  find  in  Christianity  the  declara- 
tion of  a  Trinity  in  the  Divine  Being  yet  find  this  always  asso- 
ciated with  and  subsidiary  to  the  absolute  oneness  to  whose  com- 
pleteness it  in  their  view  contributes.  It  would  be  no  more  ab- 
surd for  any  geometer  to  maintain  the  natural  circularity  of 
squares,  or  the  identity  of  the  globe  with  the  cube,  than  it  would 
be  for  any  disciple  of  Jesus  to  doubt  the  absolute  oneness  of 
God ;  and  the  moment  any  exposition  of  the  Trinity  touches 
the  line  of  tri-theistic  speculation,  it  shivers  into  fragments 
against  this  immovable  article  of  faith. 

An  impression  of  unlimited  and  sovereign  Power,  belonging 
to  this  one  personal  God,  is  now  also  upon  the  world  as  it  was 
not  before,  and  of  the  dependence  of  the  universe  upon  Him;, 
with  a  similar  impression  of  His  complete  constructive  Wisdom. 
Of  course,  these  are  not  to  be  traced   altogether   directly  ta 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRmTIANITY,  49 

'Christianity,  as  a  system  of  religion,  but  also  to  those  researches 
•of  science  which  are  quickened  by  it,  and  which  give  ilhistration 
to  its  lofty  theology.  But  the  fact  is  significant  that  such  science 
has  been  possible  only  where  the  basis  f^r  it  was  furnished  by  a 
clear  apprehension  of  God's  oneness  and  power.  The  Macedo- 
nian Aristotle  is  esteemed  its  father :  and  his  famous  cosmologi- 
cal  proof  of  the  existence  of  an  infinite  immaterial  Energy, 
unmoved  and  all-moving,  inclosing  in  itself  all  time  and  infinity, 
was  not  so  much  a  deduction  from,  as  an  indispensable  condi- 
tion to,  his  physical  research.  He  may  have  found  an  impulse 
to  it  from  the  Jews,  with  whom  he  had  lively  intercourse. 
Whencesoever  it  came,  it  made  him  the  one  master  of  science 
domesticated  at  Athens;  and  he,  because  of  it,  was  expelled 
from  the  city. 

Just  so  far  as  Christianity  has  accustomed  the  world  to  its 
radical  doctrine  of  a  changeless  and  omnipotent  personal  God,  it 
has  given  to  science  an  undecaying  basis  and  impulse.  If  mira 
cles  are  accepted  as  having  been  wrought  for  this  religion,  tliej 
show  a  power  as  unsearchable  as  any  which  the  astronomei 
needs,  for  the  support  of  furthest  suns,  or  the  configuration  oi 
remotest  and  vastest  nebular  systems.  If  they  are  denied,  it  can- 
not  be  denied  that  such  an  impression  was  made  of  God's 
power,  by  the  Faith  which  Christianity  exalted  to  completeness, 
and  by  Jesus  himself,  that  miracles  seemed  to  men  not  improb- 
able.  And  He  of  whom  the  Nazarene  taught  that  He  cares  for 
the  sparrow,  and  clothes  the  lily  by  His  delicate  touch  with  its 
daintiest  grace,  only  shows  therein  the  constructive  skill  of 
which  science  searches  the  manifestations  in  shells  or  insects,  in 
the  analysis  of  fibre,  or  in  the  secret  chemistry  of  plants.  What- 
ever she  discovers,  by  lens  or  drill,  by  experiment  or  induction, 
only  gives  the  light  of  further  illustration  to  that  doctrine  of 
God  which  has  been  incessantly  widening  in  the  world  since 
Christianity  drove  from  the  thought  of  mankind  the  gross  or 
fanciful  schemes  of  divinity  with  which  the  old  world  reeked  or 
rang.  She  must  be  a  witness,  whether  joyfully  or  not,  to  the  gran- 
deur of  the  religion  which  has  given  to  her  her  larger  freedom 
.and  finer  inspiration. 

The  discovery  of  the  Eternity  of  God,  which  came  also  to  tha 
4 


50 

world  through  the  religion  unfolded  in  part  in  the  Old  Testa^ 
ment,  but  fully  in  the  New,  has  the  same  relation  to  man's  high- 
est powers,  and  especially  to  his  studies  in  science.  It  anticipater 
the  largest  demands  of  these,  and  gives  to  them  unbounded 
scope.  To  get  the  amplitude  needed  here,  unbroken  by  bar- 
riers of  time,  Aristotle  had  affirmed  unmeasured  duration  as  the 
sphere  of  primal  energy;  while  Plato  seems  to  have  conceived 
of  the  universe  as  an  unwasting  living  thing,  compounded  by 
the  creator  of  the  whole  of  each  of  its  four  elements,  not  liable 
to  old  age  or  decay,  with  a  soul  of  its  own  at  once  centered  and 
diifused  :  itself  a  God,  alone  in  its  kind,  and  sufficient  to  itself."* 
There  was  no  philosopher  among  the  Hebrews,  and  none  among- 
the  followers  of  Jesus,  who  could  measure  himself  with  that 
illustrious  teacher  of  the  Academy,  whose  genius  has  at  once 
mastered  and  inspired  so  many  greatest  thinkers  of  the  world.. 
But  it  may  certainly  be  said  that  in  the  doctrine  of  God's  Eter- 
nity, which  they  with  such  an  emphasis  taught,  they  gave  a  ba- 
sis which  he  himself  could  never  parallel  for  all  conceivable 
cosmical  processes. 

If  the  astronomer  counts  live  hundred  millions  of  years  since 
the  first  fire-mist  began  to  be  condensed  to  make  the  earth,  if 
the  evolutionist  holds  it  probable  that  an  equal  interval  of  ages 
has  elapsed  since  the  first  life-germ  appeared  upon  the  planet — 
I  am  not  committed,  in  either  case,  to  their  calculations ;  but  I 
match  the  periods  demanded  by  them  against  the  Eternity  repre- 
sented in  the  Bible  as  the  sphere  of  God's  life,  and  they  do  not. 
exhaust  or  even  diminish  it.  "  In  the  Beginning,"  that  is 
the  majestic  and  interminable  expression,  ''  God  created  the 
heavens  and  the  earth";  and  "in  the  Beginning,"  that  is  the 
response  from  the  century  which  saw  Christianity  complete,  "  the 
Word  was  with  God,  and  the  Word  was  God."  The  longest, 
conceivable  periods  of  time  are  here  surpassed,  as  the  drop  by 
the  ocean,  or  the  reach  of  the  hand  by  the  bend  of  the  heavens ; 
and  they  who  never  saw  telescope  or  microscope,  and  who  had 
learned  nothing  in  any  school  of  the  impalpable  majesties  of 
creation,  in  declaring  to  the  woi'ld  a  personal  God,  sole  and  sov*. 


Timseus,  30-33. 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITT,  51 

ereign,  of  unsearchable  wisdom  and  a  power  eternal,  not  only  sur- 
passed all  previous  teachings,  not  only  conveyed  to  human  souls 
the  grandest  thoughts  which  these  can  ^receive,  but  they  gave  to 
the  largest  discoveries  of  science,  or  its  remotest  and  subtlest 
hypotheses,  warrant  and  liberty. 

But  it  is,  of  course,  when  we  turn  to  the  special  impression 
on  the  world  through  the  teaching  of  Christianity  conceniing 
the  temper  and  character  of  God,  that  we  find  it  in  most  vivid 
and  absolute  contrast  with  the  religions  which  it  displaced ;  in 
which  no  tendency  had  appeared  toward  its  majestic  and  lus- 
trous declarations ;  by  comparison  with  which  its  vital,  regal,  if 
we  may  not  say  its  celestial  supremacy,  becomes  most  apparent. 
Here  too  the  fully  developed  system  is  associated  vitally  with 
that  which  preceded  ;  but  it  did  far  more  than  simply  prolong 
that.  It  has  its  own  imperial  lessons,  as  characteristically  be- 
longing to  it  as  does  perfume  to  the  violet,  or  the  radiant  azure 
to  the  sapphire. 

In  the  manifold  popular  religions  of  the  world  the  tendency 
has  been  constant  to  make  the  god  like  his  worshipper,  with  only 
greater  knowledge  and  force,  and  a  larger  opportunity :  as  the 
traveler  among  the  high  Alps  sees  his  image  reflected  from  the 
clouds,  huge  and  terrific.  Here  and  there  a  philosopher  might 
conceive  of  a  Being,  hardly  personal  however,  who  dwelt  apart 
in  unexcited  supremacy  while  men  wrangled  or  suffered,  were 
enslaved  or  victorious,  lived  or  died.  The  Brahman  may  at  times 
have  seen  in  his  supreme  God  a  sovereign  Intelligence,  to  be 
approached  by  devout  contemplation,  and  into  whose  essential 
splendor  the  worshipper  might  hope  at  last  to  be  absorbed.  But 
the  common  mind,  however  quick  to  receive  impressions — as  the 
Greek  mind  was,  as  the  Indian  must  have  been — has  never  held 
fruitfully  so  remote  a  conception,  and  has  come  back  to  the  wor- 
ship of  a  god  with  all  the  parts  and  passions  of  our  nature  in 
gigantic  development.  The  very  forces  of  nature  have  been 
humanized  by  man's  fancy,  that  he  might  thus  draw  nearer  to 
them.  Mohammedanism  itself,  largely  indebted  for  its  more 
recent  conception  of  God  to  Hebrew  and  to  Christian  sources, 
hardly  does  more  than  reflect  in  that  conception  the  character  of 
its  prophet.     A  stern,  absolute,  unloving  Will,  demanding  only 


:^t  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD, 

to  be  obeyed,  that  is  the  Koran-conception  of  God :  a  Being  who 
will  give  to  the  fullest  measure  what  those  who  serve  Him  most 
desire — the  sensual  joy,  ever  fresh  and  immortal,  of  drunkenness 
and  of  lust.  It  stands  in  as  fearful  a  contrast  as  possible,  thia 
bard  and  ruthless  later  system,  with  the  teachings  of  Christianity. 
It  wants  even  the  grace  of  Attic  heathenism ;  which  at  least,  amid 
rail  its  childish  follies  and  sensual  vagaries,  built  an  altar  to  Pity, 
and  made  that  honored  wherever  through  the  world  men  looked 
with  admiration  to  the  "  City  of  the  violet  crown." 

It  is  not  needful  to  show  in  what  absolute  contrast  with  thia 
whole  trend  of  the  ethnic  religions  is  that  alleged  discovery  of 
God  which  was  made  in  part  through  the  Hebrew  economy,  and 
which  is  completed  and  proclaimed  by  Christianity. 

The  pure  character  of  God — that  is  the  basal  element  in  it :  a 
character  of  intense  clarity  and  brightness,  which  man  does  not 
even  like  to  contemplate,  and  from  which  he  constantly  seeks  to 
escape  into  alluring  and  liberal  idolatries.  Ever  anew  this  char- 
acter is  declared,  eternal  in  God  :  in  the  Law  which  articulates 
Divine  commands ;  in  the  setting  apart  of  places  and  times  in 
which  this  Being  may  be  approached  by  him  who  fears  His  im- 
maculate purity ;  in  the  institution  of  a  priesthood,  with  sacri- 
fices, through  whom  and  which  the  soiled  but  seeking  worshipper 
may  come ;  in  the  '  benign  intolerance '  of  that  sharp  separa- 
'jfcion,  inexorably  enforced,  between  the  worshipper  of  the  true 
God  and  the  worshipper  of  the  false  ;  and  in  a  thousand  impas- 
sioned utterances,  of  devout  enthusiasm  or  of  penitent  depreca- 
tion, ascribing  such  splendor  of  spirit  to  Him. 
.  So  keen  was  the  impression  made  on  the  tough  and  insensitive 
Hebrew  nature  that  a  fear  of  Him  in  whom  this  character  was  in- 
(jessantiy  supreme  became  the  predominant  sentiment  in  worship. 
It  was  not  at  all  an  abject  fear,  as  if  He  might  do  men  hanr 
without  reason.  It  was  not  a  fear  which  forbade  a  confidence, 
sweet  and  strong,  in  His  kind  jjurposes  toward  the  nation.  But 
it  was  the  awe,  the  contrite  sense  of  condemning  majesty,  which 
was  proper  to  the  soul  conscious  of  sin,  when  contemplating  a 
Sovereign  intolerant  of  that.  However  fascinating  the  sin  might 
be,  however  common  or  even  consecrated  in  all  the  world  out- 
side of  Palestine,  the  Hebrew  knew,  at  Corinth  or  at  Thebes  aa 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY,  5a 

Well  as  at  Jerusalem,  in  Antiochan  groves  as  on  the  terraced 
slopes  at  Betlileliern,  that  the  God  of  his  fathers  was  the  enemy 
of  that  sin,  and  that  His  displeasure — like  a  swift,  silent,  con- 
suming fire — would  follow  its  commission.  However  signal 
might  be  the  prosperity  of  the  nation  which  He  fostered,  how- 
ever stately  or  lovely  the  house  which  men  erected  for  His  wor. 
ship,  catching  suggestions  for  its  ornate  architecture  from  Egyp- 
tian, Phenician,  Persian  models,  bringing  into  it  the  lily,  the 
lotus,  and  the  palm,  carving  with  dexterous  Syrian  skill  its- 
flower-capitals,  overlaying  it  with  plates  or  hanging  it  with  chaina^ 
of  Indian  gold — however  full  of  thanksgiving  and  praise  might 
be  the  service  offered  before  Him,  still  the  fear  of  the  Lord 
was  always  to  the  Hebrew  **  the  beginning  of  wisdom."  The 
vivid,  supreme,  impenetrating  impression  of  the  lucid  lightnings 
of  His  sovereign  holiness  pervaded  the  moral  life  of  His  wor- 
shipper. 

No  more  remarkable  or  subliming  thought  had  ever  been  con- 
veyed to  man.  Intelligence  and  power,  both  eternal,  take  from 
this  character  their  ultimate  and  transcending  moral  lustre.  It 
seems,  at  once,  to  vindicate  itself  as  not  suggested  by  the  crafty 
or  covetous  spirit  of  man,  but  by  Ham  above  of  whom  it  teaches, 
and  who  through  it  appals  and  rules  rebellious  wills. 

When  Christianity  was  proclaimed  in  the  earth — the  consum- 
mate flower  on  the  thorny  stalk  of  the  preceding  Judaism,  the 
spiritual  system  in  which  that  was  transfigured — it  did  two 
things  in  regard  to  this  immaculate  purity  immanent  in  God. 
It  illustrated  more  fully  its  meaning  and  energy,  and  it  made 
that  the  possession  of  mankind  which  before  had  pertained  to 
a  separated  people.  "  Holy,  holy,  holy,  is  the  Lord  of  hosts,"  is 
the  cry,  not  of  seraphim  only,  but  of  saints,  in  all  the  New  Testa- 
naent.  That  God  is  to  be  feared  by  one  cleaving  to  sin,  as  well 
as  to  be  sought  with  eager  desire  by  one  ready  to  leave  it,  as  the 
stars  in  the  sky  this  is  evident  in  Christianity.  Jesus  himself, 
as  admitted  by  all,  was  intolerant  of  sin,  though  inviting  and 
welcoming  toward  each  who  turned  from  it.  With  flaming  eye, 
and  a  voice  whose  intonations  still  reverberate  from  the  page, 
he  rebuked  pride,  greed,  malice,  an  undue  passion  though 
aroused  for  himself,  the  simulation  of  unreal  virtue,  the  lust 


54  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD, 

within  even  if  unexpressed  in  the  life,  a  mere  indifference  to  spir. 
itual  welfare.  Not  in  the  Decalogue,  not  in  the  sternest  warn- 
ings of  Old  Testament  prophets,  is  the  Divine  pureness  of  thought 
and  will  so  radiantly  apparent  as  in  the  sermon  preached  by  hira 
on  the  grass-covered  ridge  of  the  Horns  of  Hattin.  It  is  incor- 
porate in  his  life,  in  every  action  which  illustrates  his  spirit. 
To  those  who  accept  his  death  as  a  sacrifice,  appointed  of  God 
as  the  condition  of  the  remission  of  human  sin,  the  eternal  holi- 
ness foreshadowed  in  ritual,  priesthood,  and  silent  splendor  of 
the  column  of  the  Shekinah — finds  its  ultimate  earthly  expres- 
sion on  the  Cross.  But  even  if  that  be  not  so  understood,  the 
Divine  purity,  resplendent  in  Jesus,  must  make,  as  it  has  made, 
an  incessant  and  an  indelible  impression  on  the  mind  of  the 
world.  As  exhibited  in  him,  giving  him  his  lordship,  consti- 
tuting the  light  to  enlighten  the  nations,  it  smote  with  instant 
and  powerful  impact  on  the  souls  of  his  disciples ;  and  the  final 
description,  by  his  last  surviving  personal  disciple,  of  Him  who 
is  utterly  righteous  and  true,  surrounded  by  those  redeemed  and 
renewed  to  a  similar  righteousness,  only  answers  to  all  which 
had  gone  before  in  setting  forth  this  perfect  holiness.  As  the 
indestructible  azure  in  sea  or  sky,  as  the  golden  beauty  in  the 
sunshine,  this  character  appears,  throughout  both  the  Testa- 
ments, immortal  in  God. 

The  gods  before  had  given  no  law,  had  had  no  interest  in 
human  morality,  and  had  exemplified  everything  in  character 
known  to  man  except  the  element  of  imperative  virtue.  Here 
was  a  God,  for  the  first  time  proclaimed  to  all  the  world,  to 
whom  sin  was  the  scarring  scorch  of  hell :  who  would  follow  it 
with  a  steady  and  victorious  displeasure  never  attributed  to  even 
that  INemesis  who  hated  prosperity,  and  to  propitiate  or  repel 
whose  possible  anger  at  his  singular  successes,  Caesar,  in  the 
very  pride  of  his  triumph,  was  fain  to  repeat  a  magical  formula 
on  ascending  his  chariot. 

The  new  impression  thus  made  on  the  world,  of  the  character 
of  God,  is  one  of  the  preeminent  facts  of  history.  It  is  all  the 
more  striking  because  so  many  had  tried  to  make  some  similar 
though  infinitely  fainter  impression,  and  had  signally  failed. 
Pindar  had  said,  that  favorite  lyric  singer  of  the  Hellenic  world 


INTRODTTCED  BY  CHRmTIANITY.  55 

that  nothing  unbecoming  should  be  recited  of  the  divinities. 
Pythagoras  had  said,  as  quoted  by  Plutarch,  that  men  are  then 
best  when  coming  nearest  the  gods.*  The  illuminated  Plato — 
^  the  greatest  man  of  the  ancient  world  ' — had  rejected  as  fables 
w^hatever  attributed  immorality  to  them.  Socrates  had  risen 
-higher  yet,  and  had  affirmed  that  the  service  paid  to  the  Deity 
by  the  pious  soul  is  the  most  grateful  sacrifice,  and  that  no  real 
evil  can  happen  to  a  good  man  under  God,  either  in  life  or 
•after  death ;  and  by  Sophocles,  and  JEschylus,  with  all  the  doubt 
of  the  Divine  rectitude  which  they  represent,  it  had  been  taught, 
in  the  stately  accents  of  tragic  song,  that  recompense  must  over- 
take the  guilty,  and  that  even  an  insolent  thought  shall  be  pun- 
ished. But  no  one  of  these,  nor  all  combined,  nor  any  other  on 
whom  had  played  the  prophesying  fore-gleams  of  the  transcend- 
•ent  light,  had  ever  persuaded  the  peoples  which  honored  them — 
much  more,  mankind — that  the  gods  were  not  drunken,  passion- 
ate, profligate,  given  to  jealousy,  lust,  and  war.  The  drift  of  hu- 
man nature  had  set  always  that  way :  till  even  Brahmanism,  which 
at  its  height  contemplated  God  as  an  absolute  Intelligence, 
though  careless  of  character  and  not  intent  on  moral  distinc- 
tions, became  so  corrupt  that  Buddhism,  under  Gautama,  revolt- 
ed, and  substituted  for  it  an  absolute  atheism.  Even  Cicero,  in 
his  ample  and  elaborate  writings,  derives  no  argument  for  virtue 
from  the  character  of  the  gods,  but  relies  solely  upon  philos- 
ophy to  show  the  end,  the  object,  and  the  standard,  of  right  life 
and  noble  action. f  By  Christianity,  and  only  by  that,  has  the 
world  which  it  educates  been  taught  the  lesson,  now  recognized 
by  all  as  prime  in  religion,  that  immaculate  sweetness  and  splen- 
dor of  character  is  the  glory  of  God,  and  that  only  the  pure  in 
heart  shall  see  Him. 

And  yet — what  could  hardly  have  been  expected — with  thit 
Purity  in  God,  from  which  men  had  instinctively  recoiled  in 
their  consciousness  of  personal  moral  exposure,  a  wholly  new 
discovery  is  made  by  Christianity  of  His  kindness,  compassion, 
and  solicitude  for  men  :  all  flowing  from  the  Love  which  is  the 
Tital  element  of  holiness,  and  which  is  declared  with  imperative 


*  De  Superstit.  IX.  t  Tuscul.  Qusest.,  I. :  4,  26 ;  II. :  4 ;  V. :  2 ;  *«  al 


m  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD, 

energy  to  be  His  essential  spiritual  being ;  since  "  God  ift  Love  ^ 
affirms  the  last  Christian  apostle.  Out  of  this  flow,  as  in  it  are 
involved,  intense  sympathies,  radiant  compassions,  providen- 
tial cares,  fatherly  affections.  This  impression  of  God,  inacces- 
sible to  early  ethnic  thought,  only  dimly  expressed  in  Hebrew 
Scriptures,  but  declared  with  perfect  emphasis  by  Christianity, 
has  been  widening  in  the  world  ever  since  it  was  proclaimed, 
with  a  power  which  we  continually  feel. 

That  the  interest  and  care  of  heavenly  Powers  extend  to  all 
creatures — ^that  in  their  cloudless  celestial  seats  they  take  note  of 
the  ant,  the  insect,  and  the  snail — this  is  no  thought  which  heathen- 
ism generates,  or  for  which  its  theology  has  room.  Whatever  may 
have  been  the  conception  concerning  man,  in  his  relation  to  the 
gods,  such  creatures  as  these  have  always  been  recognized  as  de- 
veloped under  general  laws,  by  impersonal  or  inferior  forces. 
Christianity  presents  God  as  the  author  of  all  things,  and  as  in- 
terested in  all ;  and  it  acknowledges  no  interval  between  His 
Bovereign  and  immeasurable  glory  and  His  care  for  such  creat- 
ures. It  is  an  axiom  with  it  that  as  in  Him  is  eternal  majesty, 
BO  in  Him  is  an  infinite  love ;  and  that  His  benignity  extends  in 
their  measure,  and  according  to  their  needs,  to  the  grass  of  the 
field  and  the  birds  of  the  air,  to  the  very  ephemera  whose  span 
of  life  is  the  swift  summer's  day.  So  all  investigation  of  minor 
AS  of  superior  forms  of  organization,  as  now  enlightened,  feels 
itself  following  Divine  processes,  treading  in  the  track  of  the  In- 
iinite  wisdom,  when  it  searches  the  structure  of  humming- 
bird or  of  bee,  of  the  flower  beneath,  or  of  the  butterfly  that 
ijails  flower-like  in  the  air,  released  and  winged.  It  rests  upon 
the  lesson,  of  which  philosophy  had  not  dreamed,  of  which 
glimpses  had  been  caught  by  psalmist  and  seer,  but  which  was 
firet  so  announced  by  Christianity  as  to  fill  the  world  with  its- 
bright  effluence : — the  lesson  that  He  who  built  the  universe  is 
immanent  in  nature,  with  a  loving  compassion  as  unlimited  as 
His  power,  and  that  nothing  is  too  humble,  as  nothing  is  too 
high,  for  His  thoughtful  regard. 

That  such  compassions  extend  to  man,  the  highest  of  terres- 
trial creatures,  is  a  matter  of  course  in  the  New  Testament 
There  is  no  room  in  all  its  compass  for  any  conception  of  hear 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  57 

then  Fate ;  but  a  Divine  providence  is  recognized  in  it,  as  it  never 
had  been  by  even  Xenophon  or  Socrates,  and  certainly  not  by 
the  popular  religions.  It  is  a  providence  which  extends  to  the 
humble  and  obscure,  to  the  child  as  to  the  adult,  never  impinging 
on  their  fine  sense  of  freedom,  but  guiding  each  with  a  touch 
more  impalpable  than  that  of  the  unseen  air  on  the  muscle. 

It  is  the  providence  of  a  Father  in  Heaven :  and  this  concep- 
tion of  God  for  the  first  time  shines  here,  in  an  exhibition  at 
once  luminous  and  tender.  Max  Miiller  finds  the  "Heavenly 
Father  "  a  name  for  God  among  all  the  original  Aryan  peoples, 
and  traces  the  name  in  the  ancient  mythologies  of  India,  Greece, 
Italy,  Germany :  a  striking  indication  that  monotheism — how- 
ever wanting  in  persistent  cosmical  energy — had  been  to  these 
peoples  the  primitive  religion,  and  that  some  way  or  other,  in 
historical  times,  they  had  fearfully  fallen  from  its  high  level. 
But  even  that  early  name  of  "  Father  "  did  not  mean  what  it 
means  in  the  Christian  sense,  as  Coulanges,  for  example,  has  for- 
cibly shown.  It  did  not  imply,  what  even  under  Stoicism  it  did, 
a  generative  paternity,  for  which  other  names  stood  side  by  side 
with  it.  It  did  not  in  the  least  imply  affectionate  paternity. 
It  represented  supremacy,  only :  was  applied  by  poets  to  those 
whom  they  honored;  by  slaves  and  clients  to  Master  and 
Patron.  The  idea  which  it  contained  as  applied  to  the  gods 
was  of  paramount  authority,  superlative  dignity.  But  Christiani- 
ty shows  the  fatherhood  of  God,  in  His  spirit  of  love,  as  well  as 
in  His  authorship  of  finite  intelligences,  extending  to  all  who  are 
born  of  His  life,  and  becoming  intense  toward  those  who  seek 
moral  fellowship  with  Him.  To  them  He  gives  gifts,  according 
to  this  conception  of  things,  which  the  mind  of  the  world  had 
wholly  failed  to  attribute  to  Him,  or  to  conceive  possible,  until 
it  was  exalted  and  instructed  by  Jesus — the  gift  of  His  owu 
thought  not  only,  but  of  His  essential  and  renovating  spiritual 
power. 

There  is  a  fact  indicated  here  which  not  only  surpasses  proba- 
bility, and  transcends  utterly  logical  analysis,  but  which  can  be 
understood,  or  certainly  can  be  verified,  only  by  experience.  The 
poet  gives  us  of  his  fancy  and  feeling,  of  his  discursive  spiritual 
thought,  or  his  treasured  knowledge,  in  the  music  of  his  melo 


58  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD, 

dious  numbers.  The  philosopher  gives  us  of  his  far  and  fine 
intellectual  schemes,  the  expression  of  the  result  of  his  mental 
intuition,  of  his  resolving  analysis  or  reconciling  synthesis.  But 
neither  poet  nor  philosopher,  nor  any  other,  ever  seeks  or  is  able 
to  impart  of  the  exquisite  life  of  his  genius,  or  the  supreme  qual- 
ities of  his  spirit.  That  it  is  reserved,  according  to  Christianity, 
for  onr  infinite  Author  to  do  for  man ;  for  every  man,  the  hum- 
blest, meanest,  who  will  accept  the  sovereign  gift.  By  the  im- 
parting of  His  own  spirit,  in  a  way  no  more  mysterious  than  is 
«very  contact  of  the  Infinite  with  the  finite,  in  a  way  wholly 
practical  in  its  effect,  He  will  quicken  and  purify,  and  knit  to 
Himself  in  immortal  sonship,  the  lonely  and  timid  human  soul. 
This  is  the  astonishing  promise  of  Christianity,  the  privilege  of 
whose  fulfilment  has  been  recognized  by  men  precisely  in  pro- 
portion to  their  faith.  What  the  noblest  ethnic  precursor  of 
the  Master — the  '  John  the  Baptist,*  as  one  has  called  him,  '  of 
the  world  before  Christ'* — vagaely  felt  as  a  daimon  within,  of  a 
strange  authority  to  restrain  and  direct,  though  not  to  renovate 
or  to  impel,  that  the  humblest  human  disciple  of  Jesus,  according 
to  the  Master,  may  aspire  to  find,  in  richer  and  more  supreme 
experience,  in  the  Spirit  of  God  ppesiding  in  his  heart.  There  is 
notliing  in  this  approximating  the  pantheistic  conception  of  hu- 
man souls,  as  transient  emanations,  to  be  reabsorbed  in  the  Di- 
vine. The  personality  of  God  is  the  vital  and  everlasting  founda- 
tion of  a  similar  personality  in  the  souls  which  He  creates.  But 
each  of  these,  according  to  Jesus,  as  strictly  and  centrally  dis- 
criminated from  God,  may  yet  receive  the  inspiring  grace  of 
His  separate  soul.  That  millions  have  thought  they  found  this 
true,  we  certainly  know.  That  it  is  among  the  most  tender  yet 
astounding  of  all  the  thoughts  which  ever  uplifted  and  crowned 
human  life,  no  thoughtful  mind  can  refuse  to  concede. 

But  something  beyond  even  this  appears,  attributed  to  God  in 
/  this  unique  and  astonishing  religion.  It  is  a  readiness  on  His  part, 
through  transcendent  self-sacrifice,  to  restore  to  Himself,  and  to 
their  rest  and  blessedness  in  Him,  the  most  vicious  and  depraved. 
Whatever  one's  theory  of  Christianity  may  be,  this  is  always 
conspicuous  in  it.     If  we  accept,  as  multitudes  do,  Jesus  the 

*  Marslglio  Ficino.     See  Neander:  "  History  of  Church  " :  Vol.  I.,  p.  18, 


INTRODUCED  BY  GHRUSTIANITY.  5<) 

Lord  as  being  himself  essentially  and  eternally  Divine,  then  thia 
becomes  indisputably  evident.  The  mystery  of  Incarnation,  the 
humiliation  and  patience  of  the  subsequent  life,  the  gloom  of 
Gethsemane,  and  the  agony  of  the  Cross,  have  here  to  such  their 
infinite  meaning.  It  was  not  suffering  inflicted  on  a  creature,  it 
was  suffering  which  He  who  held  miracles  in  His  hand  accepted 
for  Himself,  which  became  the  ground  of  man's  spiritual  life. 
In  that  conception  of  Christ,  sovereignty  yields  the  preeminence 
to  sympathy ;  and  the  power  which  holds  the  worlds  on  their 
poise  is  not  dimmed  but  is  diademed  by  the  infinite  pathos  of 
stupendous  condescension.  ^ 

But  even  if  men  only  see  in  Jesus  the  perfect  representative 
of  the  Infinite  Father,  in  the  wisdom  of  his  mind,  and  the  ten- 
der, heroic.  Divine  benignity  which  inheres  in  his  spirit,  the 
same  supreme  truth  becomes  still  apparent.  For  more  at  least  ^ 
than  any  other  is  he  to  such  the  witness  for  God.  JN"ot  merely  his 
precepts,  teachings,  promises,  then  express  to  us  God's  heart ; 
but  his  readiness  to  suffer,  even  to  die,  to  die  in  ignominy,  die 
in  agony,  that  he  might  thus  draw  men  to  himself.  Unless  we 
degrade  the  whole  history  of  his  death  to  the  flattest  level  of 
common  murder,  accomplished  by  hatred  on  the  helpless,  that 
supreme  self-surrender  for  the  ignorant,  for  his  enemies,  becomes 
to  us  a  mirror,  from  whose  streaming  yet  resplendent  surface 
flashes  reflected  the  moral  glory  of  Him  who  shaped  and  estab- 
lished the  suns.  The  Son  has  still  declared  to  us  the  Father. 
We  see  God's  temper  evident  and  illustrious  in  his  utter  self- 
devotion,  as  we  see  His  power  in  the  miracles  which  were 
wrought,  if  these  we  accept.  The  more  closely,  in  other  words, 
we  associate  the  spirit  of  Jesus  with  God,  the  more  fully  shall 
we  see  in  his  voluntary  Passion  the  direct  revelation  of  the 
heart  of  the  Inflnite.  He  who  on  any  theory  stood  nearest  to 
that  heart,  and  was  in  innermost  sympathy  with  it,  has  given  us 
the  key  to  its  unimagined  treasures  of  love,  in  the  crowning 
tragedy  of  the  history  of  the  world.  The  Southern  Cross,  blaz- 
ing upon  the  distant  heavens,  cannot  so  show  the  power  of  God, 
and  the  eternal  majestj  of  His  plan,  as  does  that  darkened  Cross, 
on  the  low  hill  outside  the  gates,  declare  the  spirit  of  self-sacri- 
fice in  Him,  if  His  Son  has  fairly  revealed  Him.  / 


60  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  QOD, 

If  Christianity,  in  other  words,  be  a  religion,  and  not  the 
mere  uncertain  philosophy  of  a  Jew  who  was  killed,  this  Love 
in  God,  carried  to  utter  fulness  of  development  toward  even  the 
degraded  and  the  depraved,  shines  supreme  on  its  front.  There 
is  an  element  here  of  which  no  rainbow  or  star  had  taught,  and 
the  thought  of  which  had  not  entered  man's  heart.  The  nymph 
Egeria  might  teach  !N"uma,  according  to  the  legend,  in  the  fond- 
ness of  a  personal  passion,  what  were  the  proper  religious  cus- 
toms. The  Pythian  priestess,  at  what  was  esteemed  the  central 
spot  on  the  surface  of  the  earth,  might  deliver  ambiguous  mes- 
sages from  Apollo,  amid  ecstasy  and  convulsion.  But  no  other 
religion,  nor  any  poetical  compact  of  legends,  ever  supposed  the 
essential  spiritual  life  of  the  gods  to  be  imparted  to  the  soul  of 
their  worshipper.  And  assuredly  no  other  had  ever  conceived 
of  a  personal  God,  of  an  infinite  power,  with  a  pure  and  awful 
holiness  of  spirit,  yet  careful  of  the  humblest,  mindful  of  the 
meanest,  and  with  the  temper  of  utter  self-sacrifice  for  the  wel- 
fare of  others,  paramount  in  Him  I  It  seems  too  stupendous  for 
human  apprehension.  I  do  not  marvel,  though  I  see  it  with 
sadness,  that  men  even  now  find  it  incredible.  1  match  every 
other  conception  of  God  ever  known  in  the  world,  even  that 
which  obtained  among  the  instructed  Hebrew  people,  against  this 
which  is  radiant  in  the  New  Testament,  and  all  the  others — of 
philosophers  most  enlightened,  of  rapt  and  fine  poetic  spirits — 
are  as  painted  dust  in  the  comparison  :  torch-lights  beneath  the 
meridian  sun :  tinted  vapors  before  the  heaven-high  crystal  air. 
It  may  truly  be  said,  as  it  has  been  said  many  times,  that  if 
Jesus  had  done  nothing  more  than  teach  men  to  say  "Our 
Father"  in  the  Christian  sense,  his  Divine  legation  would  have 
been  justified.  Plato,  or  one  speaking  in  his  name,  had  said 
through  Socrates  in  the  second  Alcibiades:  *We  must  wait  for 
some  one  to  teach  us  our  religious  duties ;  as  Homer  says  that 
Athene  took  the  cloud  from  the  eyes  of  Diomed,  that  he  might 
recognize  gods  and  men  ':  and  that  One  now  was  in  the  world  ! 

That  the  conception  of  God  thus  authorized  and  impressed  by 
the  religion  of  Christ  has  not  universally  pervaded  the  world, 
even  where  that  religion  has  been  longest  established,  is  evident 
enough.     Such  imj^erfect  effects  were  only  to  be  expected :  as 


INTRODUCED  BY  OHRISTIANITT.  61 

the  most  ribald  blasphemies  still  mock  the  Gospels  from  those 
who  hear  them,  and  as  some  of  the  bloodiest  battles  of  the  world 
have  had  their  field  on  the  Mount  of  Beatitudes.  It  shows  how 
hard  it  has  been,  and  is,  to  hold  up  mankind  to  the  supreme  level 
of  this  Christian  theophany.  Some,  under  its  light,  have  made 
the  God  declared  by  Jesus  an  inexorable  tyrant,  and  have 
turned  Christianity  into  a  system  as  severe  and  repressive  as  that 
of  Mohammed.  Others  have  dissolved  the  whole  moral  energy 
of  God  into  an  undiscriminating  compassion,  as  careless  of  the 
governing  forces  in  character  as  were  the  gods  of  Syria  or  of 
Greece.  One  must  have  eyes  to  see  the  sunshine.  A  moral 
idiocy  can  only  transfer  its  own  image  to  the  heavens. 

But  it  cannot  be  denied,  it  is  as  certain  as  the  continents,  that 
a  change  has  occurred,  prodigious  and  inspiring,  in  the  thought 
of  the  regions  which  now  constitute  Christendom,  concerning 
the  Being  recognized  as  supreme :  and  that  this  change  dates 
from  the  point  where  the  new  religion  broke  radiantly  over  the 
earth,  as  if  the  heavens  had  then  been  opened.  There  had  been 
no  progress  toward  such  a  change,  but  only  retrogression  from 
it,  in  preceding  religions.  No  man,  or  people,  had  ever  expected, 
much  less  had  themselves  been  able  to  accomplish,  a  similar 
change.  In  those  who  have  accepted  Christianity  with  the 
heartiest  faith,  the  effect  which  it  has  wrought  in  this  direction 
has  been  as  novel  as  it  has  been  surpassing. 

As  I  have  suggested,  a  science  which  was  impossible  before, 
has  taken  from  it  basis  and  impulse.  History  has  ceased  to  be 
an  enigma,  beneath  the  discovery  of  an  order  of  events  foreseen 
by  Him  who  is  thus  declared  sovereign  in  energy,  and  prescient 
in  thought.  There  is  now  a  majestic  rhythm  in  it.  It  is  felt  to 
be  moving  toward  remote  consummations.  Even  nature  has 
been  enjoyed  with  fresh  enthusiasm,  in  the  light  of  the  new  and 
larger  knowledge  of  Him  who  ordained  it ;  and  a  love  of  land- 
scape, unfamiliar  to  the  world  of  heathen  thought,  is  almost  as 
present  as  household  affection  in  the  realm  of  modern  life  and 
letters.  There  is  a  courage  and  hopefulness  of  spirit,  not  felt 
before:  an  expectation  of  better  ages.  There  has  passed  a 
transcendent  impu  se  into  poetry;  and  songs  are  now  heard 
such  as  never  before  had  stirred  the  air,  exalting  the  spirit  ai 


62  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  QOD, 

with  the  rush  of  angelic  plumes.  Philosophy  itself  takes  finei 
exactness,  on  higher  levels,  with  larger  range ;  while  the  charac- 
teristic spiritual  life  of  the  modern  believer  infolds  elements 
unparalleled,  nnimagined,  in  the  earlier  time.  The  lowliest  feel 
themselves  related  in  spirit  to  the  Lord  of  the  Universe.  The 
little  child  feels  it,  as  w^ell  as  the  mature ;  the  savage  just  en- 
lightened, as  well  as  the  cultured  Christian  disciple ;  the  peasant, 
uninstructed  in  human  knowdedge,  only  more  easily  than  the 
savant.  It  is  not  strange  to  such,  henceforth,  that  God  has 
builded  a  city  above,  and  has  crowded  it  with  glories  which 
men  cannot  prefigure,  that  they  at  last  may  share  His  rest.  It 
is  not  strange,  or  passing  belief,  that  the  hand  which  holds  the 
universe  together  should  wipe  the  tears  from  human  eyes. 

The  grandest,  tenderest,  most  inspiring  thought  which  the 
mind  of  the  world  has  ever  received  is  this  of  God,  now  made 
familiar  to  it  through  Jesus.  Even  the  sceptic  has  to  admit  it 
the  loveliest  of  dreams ;  w^hile  the  discerning  student  of  history 
finds  in  it  the  source  of  a  vast,  prophetic  change  in  the  life  of 
mankind.  I  do  not  now  argue,  you  observe,  for  the  truth  of 
this  conception  of  God ;  but  I  point  to  the  majesty,  harmony, 
and  impressiveness  of  it,  and  to  its  effects,  as  vital  and  grand  be- 
yond possible  cavil.  It  holds  its  place,  while  ages  pass ;  as  unaf- 
fected by  changes  of  custom  or  mutations  of  states  as  the  atmos- 
phere is  by  the  waving  of  trees.  It  involves  supremest  blessing 
and  promise.  All  character,  rooted  in  love  to  the  Highest,  takes 
from  that  a  superior  glory ;  philanthropy,  heroism,  domestic  af- 
fection, the  very  passion  of  patriotism,  being  ennobled  and  con- 
secrated by  it.  Self-surrender  for  the  truth,  self-sacrifice  for 
others,  which  were  the  rare  experience  of  the  few,  have  become 
the  familiar  enthusiasm  of  many,  since  their  Divine  authority 
and  splendor  appeared  in  Jesus ;  and  no  occasional  fitful  ecstasy 
of  Philo  or  Plotinus  could  rival  that  sweet  and  solemu  joy  which 
has  come  to  millions  of  human  souls  since  the  God  of  the  New 
Testament  was  declared  to  the  world. 

There  is  no  department  of  human  experience  on  which  there 
does  not  fall  to-day  a  beneficent  force  from  that  declaration.  The 
change  from  the  old  world  to  the  new^,  in  this  regard  if  in  no 
other,  can  only  be  compared  to  the  change  of  which  the  voyagei 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  63 

Is  sensible  wLeo,  turning  his  keel  from  Arctic  seas,  he  meets  on 
the  mighty  oceanic  current  airs  prophetic  already  of  the  soft- 
ness, the  fragrance,  and  the  serene  brilliance,  of  unreached 
tropics.  If  the  religion  announced  in  words  so  strangely  simple, 
yet  so  full  of  authority,  from  the  rugged  and  lowly  hills  of  Gal- 
ilee, had  done  nothing  else  but  make  this  impression  on  the  life 
of  mankind,  it  would  take  its  place  as  the  highest,  most  positive, 
and  beneficent  energy  which  the  earth  has  contained ;  surpassing 
arts,  and  arms,  and  ethics,  as  the  unsounded  skies  surpass  our 
roofs.  It  might,  assuredly,  have  come  from  God — whether  in 
fact  it  did  so  or  not — if  only  for  this  purpose  of  teaching  man- 
kind what  before  had  not  been  affirmed  or  surmised  concerning 
Him  whom  all  the  peoples  had  dimly  felt  or  keenly  feared,  but 
the  picture  of  whose  radiant  and  sovereign  holiness,  vital  with 
Love,  was  hung  upon  no  celestial  constellations,  was  imaged  on 
no  poetic  fancy,  is  only  shown  to  the  world  which  it  blesses  in 
the  mifision,  the  words,  and  the  face  oi  Jesus  I 


LECTUEE    III. 


THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN,  INTRODUCED  Bl 
CHRISTIANITY. 


LECTURE  III. 

That  another  and  a  nobler  conception  of  God  has  been  mide 
familiar  and  commanding  in  Christendom  by  the  religion  wh^ch 
has  moulded  and  taught  this,  will  probably  hardly  be  den*«d. 
It  must  certainly  be  conceded  by  any  one  surveying  \iitb 
candid  attention  the  progress  and  change  of  human  thought  on 
this  sublime  theme.  But  that  any  equivalent  change  has  oc- 
curred in  man's  conception  of  his  own  nature,  may  not  so  ea  ii\j 
be  admitted.  It  woidd,  no  doubt,  have  seemed  antecedently  far 
less  probable. 

Whatever  else  man  does  not  know,  it  might  plausibly  liavft 
been  said,  he  must  be  expected  to  know  himself.  The  eleracwlo 
of  that  knowledge  are  within  him.  The  faculty  for  detecting  and 
combining  these  elements,  in  systematic  representation,  car 
scarcely  be  increased  or  essentially  changed  by  any  effect  of  re- 
ligion upon  him.  If  not  then  instantaneously  apprehended,, 
when  moral  life  begins  with  a  man,  his  knowledge  of  him^eW 
must  be  early  and  certainly  attained  ;  and  it  is  hardly  supposable 
that  important  augmentations  can  be  made  to  it  by  a  change  in 
his  forms  of  religious  service,  or  in  his  conception  of  the  Powers 
unseen.  He  cannot  be  expected  to  perceive  or  appreciate  the 
vast  and  subtile  harmonies  of  science  at  the  outset  of  his  career. 
He  cannot  be  supposed  to  have  mastered  then  the  superb 
mechanisms,  the  knowledge  of  which  implies  large  inquiry,  long 
experiment.  The  lightning,  for  him,  will  not  have  learned  to 
run  on  bis  messages.  The  needle  of  the  compass  will  not  for 
him  have  become  a  seer,  guiding  his  course  amid  the  darkness, 
and  loosening  his  keels  from  the  visible  headlands.  Not  the 
type  alone,  but  the  alphabetic  characters  which  give  that  signifi- 
cance, he  may  not  possess  till  centuries  have  succeeded  his  be- 
ginning  on  the  earth  ;  and  the  beautiful  lights  or  the  towering 
heights  of  physical  discovery  or  philosophical  speculation  maji 

(67) 


68  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

long  remain  as  unapproachable  bj  him  as  rainbows  cresting  in- 
accessible summits. 

But  one  thing,  at  any  rate,  he  must  know  from  the  start :  hig 
own  nature,  in  its  constituting  forces,  and  its  spiritual  value.  Con- 
sciousness must  precede  speculation  ;  and  speculation  can  only 
define  and  elucidate  what  consciousness  involves.  Without  lens 
or  drill,  sharpened  edge  or  chemical  solvent,  the  man  who 
cannot  find  out  without  these  what  is  around  him,  may  discern 
by  intuition  what  is  within  him  ;  may  know  it  with  an  exactness 
to  which  no  reflection  can  add  precision,  and  with  an  assurance 
whose  fullness  no  contrary  argument  can  abate.  Even  as  the 
most  perfect  poetry — in  its  motive,  and  for  its  use — has  some- 
times appeared  in  the  earliest  time,  in  lyric,  dithyrambic,  epic 
song,  in  tales  of  Troy  or  northern  sagas,  some  song  of  Roland, 
or  some  weird  and  passionate  Nibelungen-Lied,  so  man's  knowl- 
edge of  himself  may  be  expected  to  be  as  perfect  at  first  as  ever 
thereafter,  and  his  earliest  insight  to  teach  him  all  which  an}^ 
religion  or  philosophy  can. 

This,  as  I  have  said,  might  seem  to  be  the  fair  presumption, 
independently  of  historical  facts ;  making  it  doubtful  whether  any 
religion,  however  peculiarly  and  transcendently  Divine,  could 
add  essential  or  crowning  elements  to  man's  knowledge  of  him- 
self. Especially  might  such  a  doubt  appear  justified  when  philos- 
ophers had  arisen,  still  preceding  such  a  religion,  who,  in  instances 
at  least,  as  of  Plato  or  Socrates,  and  in  some  departments 
of  self-revealing  inquiry,  seem  to  have  sounded  all  the  depths, 
unveiled  the  heights,  and  opened  to  view  the  wide  expanses  of 
man's  intellectual  and  spiritual  being.  Here,  at  least,  it  might 
reasonably  be  said,  neither  Christianity  nor  any  possible  form  of 
religion  can  make  important  further  contributions  to  the  knowl- 
edge of  man  conceraing  the  powers  which  his  nature  infolds,  or 
eonceming  its  proper  lordship  on  the  earth.  In  theology  it  mny 
teach ;  in  psychology  it  can  say  nothing  novel. 

Undoubtedly  in  this  there  is  an  element  of  truth ;  and  as  na 
doubtedly,  if  it  shall  appear  that  Christianity  has  taught  th^  in- 
trospective and  aspiring  man  what  he  did  not  know  concerning 
himself — has  taught  him  that  which  his  educated  conscioufeness 
rejoices  to  recognize,  but  which  it  had  never  before  apprehended, 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  G9 

lias  thus  exalted  the  general  estimate  which  man  puts  upon  him 
self,  not  as  a  moral  person  perhaps,  but  as  a  Divinely  consti- 
tuted being,  and  has  given  him  a  new  sense  of  the  worth  of  hia 
nature,  and  of  the  place  which  belongs  to  him  amid  the  multi- 
tudinous circles  of  the  universe — if  this  shall  appear,  then  here  ia 
at  least  a  superlative  force,  which  works  at  once  for  the  welfare  of 
man  and  for  the  glory  of  Him  above  from  whom  our  nature  is 
assumed  to  have  come.  It  will  not  then  be  unnatural  to  infer, 
though  the  argument  may  certainly  not  be  demonstrative,  that 
the  system  through  which  this  fresh  and  surprising  energy  is 
exerted  proceeds  from  God,  and  not  from  any  spirit  of  man, 
surpassing  philosophy,  and  with  an  impetuous  and  imperious 
push,  after  the  failures  of  thousands  of  years,  enthroning  in  ita 
proper  supremacy,  under  the  heavens,  the  human  soul. 

That  Christianity  has  done  this  appears  to  me  evident ;  that  it 
has  done  it  by  reason  of  its  organic  structure,  not  accidentally ;  and 
that  the  changed  conception  of  man  which  certainly  now  obtaina 
in  the  world — as  compared  with  that  which  prevailed  before 
Christ,  which  now  prevails  outside  the  reach  of  his  religion — is 
not  externally  connected  with  the  religion,  as  a  gold  ornament 
imposed  upon  the  shield,  or  as  decorated  porches  and  carved 
window-caps  added  to  the  finished  frame  of  the  house,  but  has 
its  condition  in  Christianity  ;  as  the  flora  and  fauna  of  the  tem- 
perate regions,  diverse  from  those  on  arctic  parallels,  have  their 
condition,  not  so  much  even  in  soil,  as  in  the  w^armth  and  light 
which  surround  them.  It  is  this  thought  which  I  would  pre- 
sent for  your  acceptance,  if  in  the  end  you  judge  it  correct. 

I  begin  with  the  remark  that  such  an  ennobled  conception  of 
God  as  this  religion  seems  beyond  doubt  to  have  introduced 
carries  with  it,  naturally,  a  similarly  ennobled  conception  of  man. 
It  must  do  this :  since  all  men,  recognizing  a  God  at  all,  recog- 
nize man  as  in  some  sense  His  representative  on  the  earth.  The 
popular  ethnic  religions,  as  I  suggested,  have  done  this  habitu- 
ally, making  the  gods  gigantic  prototypes  of  the  spirit  in  man. 
The  Christian  system,  beginning  at  exactly  the  opposite  point, 
and  professing  to  come  from  God  to  men,  not  to  be  an  eifoit, 
successful  or  otherwise,  on  the  part  of  men  to  arise  to  God,  yet 
begins,  in  its  earliest  premise,  with  the  formal  declaration  that 


70  THE  JSEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

God  lias  made  man  in  His  own  image ;  and  it  proceeds  witb 
constant  steadiness  upon  the  assumption  that  if  the  resemblance 
in  character  has  been  lost,  or  painfully  obscured,  it  remains  in- 
delible in  the  frame  of  his  being.  It  is  only  a  religion  like 
Brahmanism,  which  recognized  God  only  as  a  neuter,  cold,  and 
passionless  First  Cause,  or  a  philosophy  like  the  Buddhistic, 
which  knows  no  God,  which  represents  existence  as  essentially 
evil,  and  which  traces  the  ultimate  life  of  its  leader  through 
more  than  five  hundred  previous  lives,  of  rat  and  crow,  dog  and 
pig,  fish,  peacock,  and  golden  eagle — it  is  these  alone  which 
find  no  specific  likeness  to  a  Divine  original  in  the  human  soul. 
Even  Stoicism,  with  its  doctrine  of  a  World-soul,  an  ether-god, 
made  the  human  soul  a  representative  of  it :  a  kind  of  evapora- 
tion of  blood,  penetrated  with  ethereal  fire  from  the  World-soul, 
destined  to  exist,  perhaps,  for  a  time  after  death,  in  a  hardly 
personal  separateness,  but  to  be  re-absorbed  at  last  into  the  primal 
originating  substance. 

Of  course,  on  such  schemes  of  thought  no  room  is  left  for  at- 
tributing a  real  royalty  of  nature  to  the  personal  human  spirit. 
It  has  no  intimate  or  organic  relationship  to  a  Divine  Personal- 
ity. It  cannot  aspire  to  essential  or  permanent  celestial  experi- 
ences. All  that  it  can  be  prompted  to  do  is  to  cultivate  a  stern 
hardness  of  will ;  to  be  careless  of  circumstances,  defiant  of  the 
future,  ready  to  part  with  individual  consciousness,  and  not 
afraid  of  any  fate.  One  need  not  go  back  to  Epictetus  or  Anto- 
ninus to  find  this.  Eead  the  despairing  and  fascinating  words — 
among  the  most  pathetic,  I  think,  that  have  been  written  in  our 
time  in  Christian  England — by  Holyoake,  the  earnest  and  elo- 
quent Secularist  leader,  addressed  to  the  people  whom  he  would 
instruct,  and  see  if  this  is  not  so :  *'  Science  has  shown  us  that 
we  are  under  the  dominion  of  general  laws,  and  that  there  is  no 
special  Providence.  Nature  acts  with  fearful  uniformity  ;  stern 
as  fate,  absolute  as  tyranny,  merciless  as  death  ;  too  vast  to  praise, 
too  inexplicable  to  worship,  too  inexorable  to  propitiate  ;  it  haa 
no  ear  for  prayer,  no  heart  for  sympathy,  no  arm  to  save."  ^ 


♦  See  Farrar's  Lects.  on  "Critical  History  of  Free  Thought":  London 
ed.,  1862  ;  page  441  [note]. 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  71 

From  such  a  conception  of  the  Power  above  us,  which  is  onlj? 
harder  and  more  relentless  than  that  of  the  Stoics,  there  can 
come  no  interpreting  light  on  the  majesty  of  man's  nature,  and 
no  inspiration  to  a  higher  sense  of  the  dignity  of  his  spirit.  The 
soul,  on  this  theory,  is  simply  the  product  and  plaything  of  un- 
intelligent caprice  or  an  unmoral  force.  Its  grandest  faculties 
move  in  chains.  Its  deepest  sensibilities  are  tlie  saddest.  It  is 
walled  in  the  iron  of  force  and  law,  in  the  midst  of  a  universe 
having  no  Head.  It  is  here  that  the  agnostic  scheme — ignoring 
Ood,  or  treating  Him  as  '  the  eternal  Why  ?  to  which  no  man  has 
replied  ;  the  infinite  Enigma,  which  no  Sphinx  has  solved ' — 
deals  its  deadliest  blow,  not  more  at  revealed  religion  than  at 
human  liberty  and  civilization.  But  wherever  a  personal  God 
is  conceived,  from  whom  man  came,  whom  man  resembles  in 
spiritual  being,  there,  as  the  conception  of  the  Divine  One  is 
lifted,  the  conception  of  man  will  be  also  exalted.  And  he 
who  has  seen  the  glory  of  God,  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ,  is 
certain  to  think  more  justly  and  loftily  of  his  personal  nature, 
derived  from  a  Being  so  transce»ndent,  than  he  who  has  only 
imagined  an  Apollo,  god  of  music  and  prophecy,  or  a  lovely 
Aphrodite,  springing  lightly  from  the  foam  of  the  sea,  and  girt 
with  the  alluring  ce&tus.  I  cannot  think  that  this  needs  to  be 
argued  ;  and  so  we  may  properly  proceed  to  consider  what  man 
did  in  fact  think  of  himsfelf,  in  the  world  at  large,  in  the  times 
before  Christ. 

It  seems  too  obvious  fairly  to  be  questioned,  that  there  was  no 
prevalent  sense  in  men  of  an  essential  primitive  dignity  belong- 
ing to  their  nature.  Tlie  Greeks,  for  example,  though  inquisitive, 
aspiring,  and  bold  in  speculation,  ascribed  no  glory  to  that 
nature  from  any  imagined  Divine  energy  concerned  in  forming 
it.  Its  origin  confessedly  lay  hid  in '  the  dark  backward,  and  abysm 
of  Time';  as  Plato  said  that  'the  human  race  either  had  no 
beginning  at  all,  and  never  will  have  an  end,  but  always  will  be 
and  has  been,  or  it  had  a  beginning  an  immense  time  ago.'* 
In  the  common  understanding  of  things,  man  had  sprung  from 
the  earth — an  autochthon — and  the  grasshopper  was  his  fitting 


♦"Laws,"  VI.  :  782. 


72  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

badge.  From  rocks,  and  trees,  and  swampy  places,  some  had 
come ;  those  horn  of  the  marsh  having  legs  like  serpents. 
Heroes  themselves  had  been  earth-born  ;  and  even  the  gods,  ao» 
cording  to  Pindar,  had  drawn  their  breath  from  the  same 
mother.*  The  first  men  had  lived  as  insignificant  emmets  in 
the  excavated  earth,  or  in  the  sunless  depths  of  caverns ;  and 
Prometheus  had  first  shown  them  the  risings  and  settings  oi 
stars ;  had  made  known  to  them  letters,  numbers,  and  the  func- 
tion of  memory  ;  had  helped  them  to  the  ornaments  of  life.f 

Dissociated  thus  from  a  Divine  originator,  the  nature  of  man 
failed  to  impress  the  ancient  world  as  possessing  inherent 
splendor  or  majesty ;  and  the  immediate  impulse  was  to  honor 
its  accidents  more  than  itself,  especially  to  honor  the  extraordi- 
nary power  wliich  was  sometimes  associated  with  it,  and  to  con- 
ceive this  the  supreme  thing  in  human  experience.  Whoever 
had  this,  by  acquisition  or  inheritance,  became  thereby  an  object 
of  homage;  of  an  homage  increasing  as  the  power  became 
greater,  and  reaching  its  climax  when  that  was  sovereign.  So 
barbarous  tribes,  as  Herbert  Spencer  reminds  us,  still  worship 
their  rulers  as  divinely  descended,  as  gods  themselves ;  as  the 
Fiji  Islander,  to  take  his  illustration,  stands  unresistingly  to  be 
cut  to  the  ground  if  the  king,  who  appears  to  him  Divine,  or- 
dains his  destruction.:]:  So  our  Aryan  ancestors  worshipped  the 
weed  whose  distilled  juices  could  lift  them  for  a  moment  into 
the  excitement  of  an  imaccustomed  power. 

As  the  power  of  the  muscle  is  succeeded  and  surpassed  by  that 
of  the  mind  which  equips  and  wields  it — as  the  power  becomes 
organized,  in  a  sense  impersonal,  yet  only  therefore  more  per- 
manent and  far-reaching,  through  the  raising  of  one  in  whom  it 
is  lodged  to  the  headship  of  the  State — this  worship  becomes 
only  more  complete,  in  those  mastered  by  the  power,  and  de- 
pendent upon  it.  It  even  displaces  the  earlier  worship,  received 
from  ancestors,  of  mythical  heroes,  or  of  personified  forces  of 
nature,  whose  voice  is  in  thunder,  or  whose  play  of  motion  is  in 
the  shining  sea-surge.     It  is  simply  in  the  natural  development 


*  *'  Nemean,"  VI. :  1 .      '  t  ^schylus  :  «  Prometheus,"  44&-460. 

t  •*  First  Principles  of  System  of  Philosophy  ":  New  York  ed.,  1879,  p.  5 


INTRODUGED  BY  CERI8TIANITT,  73 

of  this  tendency  that  the  worship  of  the  Emperor,  as  I  showed 
the  other  evening,  becomes  the  enthroned  religion  of  the  State. 
No  matter  how  recent  or  mean  his  life,  how  atrocious  his  char- 
acter, how  essentially  frivolous  his  habits,  tastes,  or  personal 
faculties,  because  he  is  Emperor  he  is  worshipped  as  having  kin- 
ship and  compact  with  Divine  beings.  It  seems  almost  to  have 
been  a  part  of  the  plan  of  Providence — if  such  a  plan  may  be  at 
this  point  theoretically  assumed,  in  connection  with  our  religion 
— that  such  a  consummate  demonstration  in  history  of  the 
tendencies  of  man's  spirit  should  be  matched  simultaneously 
against  the  first  teaching  of  Christianity  in  the  world  :  that  the 
worship  of  Tiberius,  Claudius,  Caligula,  should  show  forever,  in 
colossal  exhibition,  how  natural  to  man,  in  the  civilized  as  in 
the  barbarian  state,  is  homage  toward  power ;  how  mean  hu- 
man nature  appears  to  itself,  when  set  wholly  apart  from  any 
station  of  superior  force.  Civilization  has  not  outgrown  the 
tendency,  or  learned  the  supreme  lesson  of  the  Master  that  the 
highest  of  all  should  be  servant  of  all,  and  that  of  little  children 
is  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  But  power,  at  least,  however 
valued,  has  not  the  place  in  modern  times  which  it  had  before 
Christ :  when  whoever  had  it  was  worshipped  in  proportion  to  it ; 
whoever  had  it  not,  became  despicable  in  consequence.  Te 
despise  him  was  inevitable  ;  to  enslave  him  was  legitimate. 

Among  peoples  to  whom  the  attainment  of  eminent  political 
or  military  power  was  not  possible,  as  it  was  not  to  the  Greeks 
under  the  Empire,  among  a  people  distinguished  as  they  were 
for  intellectual  activity  and  a  keenly  responsive  aesthetic  sense, 
success  in  these  nobler  domains  of  effort  gave  distinction ;  and 
weakness  of  frame,  obscurity  of  origin,  the  utter  want  of  polit- 
ical influence,  did  not  hinder  men  from  paying  their  eager  tribute 
to  the  genius  which  touched  the  canvas  with  light,  or  moulded 
the  marble  to  forms  of  passion,  or  shaped  the  quarry  into  archi- 
trave and  frieze,  or  which  uttered  rare  thought  in  melodious  num- 
bers. Still  it  was  the  accident  of  genius,  or  of  special  accom- 
plishments, not  the  original  endowment  of  nature,  to  which  the 
Greek  rendered  his  honor.  All  Greeks  were  separate  in  his 
thought  from  the  rest  of  mankind ;  and  it  was  at  Eome,  not  at 
Athens,  that   the   populace  applauded   the  poet's  words  who 


74  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

'  counted  noti  \ng  human  unworthy  of  his  regard.'  The  Greek* 
themselves  weie  sharply  separated  into  ranks  of  honor  and 
of  dishonor ;  and  one  of  the  most  significant  things  in  even 
the  highest  Greek  philosophy  is  its  disesteem  for  man  as 
such,  its  regard  for  only  the  rare  and  cultured :  as  Plato  ad* 
dresses  himself  to  the  philosophic  nature — a  plant,  he  says, 
which  but  occasionally  grows  among  men  ;  as  Aristotle  defends 
servitude  on  the  ground  that  those  of  inferior  powers  are  to  the 
abler  as  the  body  to  the  soul,  the  lower  benefited  by  serving  the 
higher ;  as  Plotinus,  later,  discriminates  sharply  between  the 
vile  rabble,  of  mechanics  and  others,  who  cannot  attain,  who  da 
not  tend  toward,  the  summit-good,  and  the  few  who  do  ;  *  as 
Tacitus  suggests  the  affectionate  hope  that  there  may  be  some 
e^^alted  spirits  which  do  not  perish  with  the  body,  as  do  the  rest. 
Always,  it  is  that  which  is  special  in  man  which  attracts  the 
philosophic  respect,  not  his  common  human  nature. 

Under  the  Brahmanic  system,  as  it  appeared  to  the  armies  of 
Alexander  in  substantially  the  characteristics  which  belong  to  it 
to-day,  the  highest  place  among  men  belonged  to  those  supposed 
to  have  power  over  the  gods  through  prayer  and  sacrifice — they 
having  issued  from  the  mouth  of  Brahman,  while  the  other  or- 
ders had  proceeded  from  his  arms,  his  thigh,  or  his  foot.  And 
even  in  this  highest  order,  it  was  the  abstracted  contemplating 
intelligence  of  the  man  twice-born,  who  entered  thus  into  con- 
ference with  the  Absolute,  and  drew  into  himself  the  infinite 
essence,  which  gave  distinction  :  a  distinction  not  dependent  on 
physical  strength,  or  on  multitude  of  possessions,  but  on  the  sup- 
posed capacity  and  habit  of  this  absorbing  contemplation  ;  a  dis- 
tinction which  naturally  raised  its  possessor  to  immeasurable  su- 
premacy above  the  other  classes  in  the  land.  Here  was  the 
germ,  or  the  organizing  power,  of  that  enormous  system  of  caste 
under  which  so  bitterly  India  has  groaned. 

There  is  something,  perhaps,  in  this  standard  of  distinction 
which  commands  our  respect  more  than  does  that  which  meas- 
ures worth  by  property,  by  muscle,  by  rank  and  leisure,  or  even 
by  genius.     But  in  Brahmanism  also,  even  at  its  best,  it  is  not 

*  See  Prof.  Fisher :    "  Beginnings  of  Christianity."     New  York  ed. 
1877,  p.  180. 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  Y5 

man,  jou  instaLtly  observe,  who  is  honored  as  such,  but  the  men 
eepaiated  distinctly  from  others,  who  have  been  quickened  to 
discern  in  nature  the  mere  play  of  illusion,  and  to  con  template 
directly  the  eternal  World-soul.  A  man  of  this  class  had  a  spe- 
cial and  splendid  value.  By  knowing  God,  he  became  God. 
But  the  rest  of  mankind  were  as  dust  and  burned  cinders  beneath 
his  feet.  • 

Buddhism  had  its  genetic  impulse  in  a  revolt  against  Brah- 
manism.  It  was  prompted  by  eager  sympathy  with  man,  and 
was  published  in  a  generous  interest  for  his  welfare.  The  legend 
of  its  author  is  one  of  the  most  attractive  in  history,  and  his 
system  largely  corresponded  with  the  story.  It  excluded  no 
one,  of  either  sex,  of  any  rank,  from  learning  the  truth,  and 
declared  itself  a  law  of  grace  for  all.  To  its  many  admira- 
ble ethical  precepts  no  student  can  fail  to  offer  his  homage. 
Its  care  for  the  poor,  its  ministry  to  the  oppressed,  are  the 
crown  of  its  glory.  Yet,  in  utter  contradiction  to  the  common 
recent  notion  about  it.  Buddhism  did  not  attack  or  disturb 
the  institution  of  caste.  It  ucft  only  maintained  this,  where 
it  secured  dominance  ;  it  appears  even  itself  to  have  introduced 
it  into  countries  which  before  it  had  not  invaded ;  and  this 
was  only  in  radical  harmony  with  its  whole  scheme  of  thought. 
No  true  conception  of  the  essential  dignity  of  personal  and 
moral  human  existence  is  possible  under  it.  That  existence  is 
regarded  as  the  radical  and  essential  evil,  which  it  is  the  height 
of  aspiration  to  annihilate.  The  life  of  man  is  common  with 
the  life  of  tiger  or  serpent,  mouse  or  bat.  It  w^as  never  contem- 
plated by  Gautama  that  all  could  attain  liberation  from  evil, 
even  by  seeking  for  non-existence  after  his  method.  A  maxim 
of  his,  in  the  "  Path  of  Virtue,"  has  even  a  tone  of  haughtiness 
in  it :  '  As  on  a  heap  of  rubbish  cast  upon  the  highway  the  lily 
will  grow,  full  of  sweet  perfume  and  delightful,  thus  the  disci- 
ple of  the  truly  Enlightened  Buddha  shines  forth  by  his  knowl- 
edge among  those  who  are  like  rubbish,  among  the  people  who 
walk  in  darkness.'  *  And  even  one  thus  distinguished  and  en. 
lightened,  as  w^e  must  not  forget,  could  only  look,  in  his  highest 


*  "  Dhammapada ;   or,  Path  of  Virtue  ";  London  ed.,  1870  ;  p.  Ixxiv. 
V8.  58-0. 


76  THE  NEW*  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

aspiration,  for  the  extinction  of  desire  and  the  subsidence  oi 
consciousness  in  that  !N"irvana  in  which  the  consummate  individ. 
nal  life  should  sink  at  last,  as  the  bubble  breaking  in  the  sea. 
Any  noble  conception  of  the  human  soul  was  in  such  a  scheme 
simply  impossible. 

In  the  Hebrew  system,  as  I  need  not  remind  you,  man,  as 
such,  if  belonging  to  "  the  people  of  God,"  had  a  value  ascribed 
to  him  unknown  elsewhere,  independent  of  property,  of  personal 
strength,  of  military  distinction,  or  of  capacity  for  affairs.  As  a 
child  of  Abraham,  to  him  Divine  promises  had  been  given  ;  for 
him  had  been  declared,  amid  majestic  phenomena,  that  sovereign 
Law  which  *  made  for  Righteousness ';  for  him  had  been  in 
stituted  the  priesthood  and  its  ritual ;  for  him,  the  illustrioub 
office  of  the  kings.  Canaan  had  been  given  not  to  a  few,  but  to 
the  many.  The  rights  of  the  poorest  were  carefully  guarded. 
The  sharp  and  strict  Agrarian  Law,  which  was  the  basis  of  the 
civil  constitution,  was  for  his  protection,  with  the  law  which  for- 
bade his  wealthier  neighbor  to  take  usury  from  him.  For  evQvy 
Hebrew,  as  the  development  oi  the  State  went  on,  because  of  his 
relation  to  the  nation  and  to  its  sovereign  Head  in  the  heavens, 
psalmists  had  sung,  prophets  had  predicted  the  future  events, 
great  teachers  of  truth  and  of  imperative  duty  had  been  preter- 
naturally  inspired  of  God,  to  bring  His  message  to  the  humblest. 
Whatever  else  may  be  tnie  or  not  of  that  remarkable  prepara- 
tory system  which  preceded  Christianity,  it  certainly  is  true  that 
it  recognized,  as  had  no  other,  the  place  of  man  amid  the  im- 
mensities, his  vast  responsibilities,  his  right  and  privilege  of  per- 
sonal communion  with  the  Most  High.  No  matter  what  his 
native  obscurity,  or  his  narrowness  of  resources,  provided  he 
were  of  the  chosen  people,  or  Lad  become  incorporated  with  that 
as  a  proselyte  accepted,  all  promises  were  his,  the  entire  theoc- 
racy was  established  and  administered  on  his  behalf. 

But  this  recognition  of  human  worth  was  still  sharply  limited 
by  one  inflexible  line  of  demarcation ;  and  to  Eoman,  Greek, 
Egyptian,  Assyrian,  the  Hebrew  did  not  ascribe  the  value  which 
confessedly  belonged  to  his  humblest  brother  in  the  Hebrew 
commonwealth.  It  was  not  human  nature,  in  itself,  that  he 
honored,  any  more  than  it  was  that  which  Plato  honored  in  the 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY,  77 

Republic,  when  he  severed  the  Greek  from  the  barbarian,  and 
treated  the  nobler  Hellenic  race  as  so  superior  that  others  were 
natively  alien  to  it.  Practically,  systematically,  the  Hebrew 
reserved  his  spiritual  regard  for  the  sons  of  the  fathers  who,  as 
he  conceived,  had  seen  the  miraculous  glory  on  the  mount,  and 
felt  the  throb  of  the  rocky  cliffs  when  Omnipotence  touched 
them ;  who  had  come  out  from  Egypt  amid  wonders  and  signs ; 
and  whose  not  remote  ancestors  had  talked  with  the  Almighty, 
and  seen  visions  of  angels.  It  was  Hebrew  nature,  rather  than 
human  nature,  which  even  to  him  possessed  intrinsic  grandeur. 

But  the  moment  we  meet  the  supremer  force  of  Christianity 
in  the  earth,  we  enter  a  changed  condition  of  thought.  This 
religion  is  preached,  by  admission  of  all,  to  Roman,  Greek, 
Syrian,  Scythian,  as  well  as  to  Jew.  It  recognizes  no  distinction 
of  classes,  but  senator  and  slave  sit  side  by  side  in  its  assemblies. 
It  lifts  the  humble,  without  degrading  the  high.  Its  first  teach- 
ers, and  distinguished  apostles,  are  taken  largely  from  the  uncult- 
ured classes.  It  acknowledges  no  limitation  to  race ;  but  as 
soon  as  the  minds  of  its  earliest  disciples  have  been  enlightened 
as  to  the  import  and  value  of  its  contents,  it  is  by  them  pro- 
claimed without  pause  to  all  who  will  hear  it,  whether  in  Asia, 
Africa,  or  Europe.  The  most  tenacious  and  stubborn  prejudice, 
in  a  mind  so  narrow  and  so  intense  as  that  of  Peter,  is  overcome 
by  this  religion ;  and  he  is  constrained,  by  an  immense  impulse 
connected  with  it,  to  offer  its  sublimest  provisions  to  the  man  at 
Cesarea,  who  especially  represents  the  fierce  and  haughty  foreign 
Power  which  has  conquered  his  country,  profaned  its  temple, 
and  heaped  gross  injury  on  himself. 

Nothing  in  history  is  more  remarkable  than  the  sudden  expan- 
sion, at  the  liberating  touch  of  this  religion,  of  the  minds  which 
had  been  rigorous  and  limited  under  the  restraints  of  their 
previous  system.  It  is  the  inrush  of  a  flood,  lifting  and  swelling 
the  trickling  stream,  till  it  fills  the  channels,  passes  all  banks, 
and  spreads  its  waves  over  widest  expanses.  It  is  the  sudden 
transfiguring  advent  of  summer-air,  which  pours  reviving  light 
and  force  over  areas  continental,  instead  of  restrii^ing  them,  as 
the  winter  had  done,  to  tropical  islands.  The  sudden  distribution 
of  accumulated  properties,  hereditary  for  centuries,  to  all  tho 


78  THE  NEW  GON-CEPTION  OF  MAN, 

needy  and  mean  of  a  nation — the  sudden  dispersion  of  master 
pieces  of  painters  and  sculptors,  lodged  for  generations  in  princely 
saloons,  to  those  who  in  the  eye  of  the  law  had  not  the  smallest 
claim  upon  them — neither  of  these  would  have  seemed  so 
strange  as  the  readiness,  the  eagerness,  of  the  early  disciples  to 
give  the  religion  which,  to  them  at  least,  seemed  Divinely  au- 
thenticated, to  all  the  world. 

It  has  become  an  instinct  with  their  successors.  It  seems  to 
us  supremely  appropriate ;  because  the  Christianity  which  they 
then  preached  has  been  for  centuries  the  life  of  the  life  of  those 
from  whom  our  blood  has  come.  But  at  the  outset  it  was  almost 
as  extraordinary  as  would  have  been  a  man  with  wings  that  a 
Jew  should  be  eager  to  preach  his  religion  to  those  who  were 
not  of  the  chosen  people,  to  those  who  in  all  political  relatioiis 
and  ancestral  affinities  stood  to  him  as  aliens  and  enemies  ;  that 
he  should  be  ready  to  plead  with  an  impassioned  earnestness  on 
behalf  of  that  religion,  in  the  face  of  danger  and  daring  death, 
before  Greeks  and  Orientals,  in  the  schools  or  the  streets  of  An- 
tioch  or  of  Ephesns ;  that  he  should  be  ready  to  take  as  its  first 
converts  in  Europe  a  proselyted  Greek  woman,  and  a  Roman 
jailer ;  that  he  should  preach,  at  Athens,  Corinth^  or  amid  the 
turbulent  multitud,es  in  Rome,  to  philosophers,  laborers,  rulers, 
soldiers,  and  heathen  slaves,  the  majestic  system  unfolded  to 
him  by  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  in  which  he  felt  that  the  whole 
revered  and  attested  theocracy  had  at  length  b«en  fulfilled.  It 
goes  without  saying  that  a  wholly  new  force  had  broken  suddenly 
into  his  spirit,  to  produce  this  unmatched  and  amazing  effect.  It 
is  as  evident  as  the  mountains  of  Moab  from  the  heights  of 
Olivet,  that  a  power  unexpected,  energetic,  expansive,  had 
wrought  a  vast  revolution  in  his  thought,  giving  him  wholly 
new  conceptions  of  the  value  of  Man,  without  reference  to 
nation,  class,  or  race,  and  showing  him  the  duty  of  each  man  to 
others,  whatever  their  social  or  political  separations. 

That  force  was  found  in  the  religion  which  he  had  accepted ; 
in  which  were  the  lessons  that  inspired  him  to  preach  it,  with- 
out  discrimination,  to  all  who  would  hear.  This  becomes  only 
the  more  apparent  when  we  remember  that  Jesus  himself,  the 
great  Teacher  of  this  religion,  so  far  as  we  learn  from  the  records 


INTRUDVGED  BY  CHRISTIAmTY,  79 

of  his  life,  almost  never  went  beyond  the  boundaries  of  \m 
country  or  nation.  He  spoke  to  his  townsmen  of  God's  ancient 
favor  to  the  woman  of  Sarepta,  and  to  the  Syrian  noble ;  and 
their  reply  was  an  effort  to  Mil  him.  The  furious  rush  toward 
the  summit  of  the  Mount  of  Precipitation  was  their  only  attempt 
to  rival  the  level  of  his  sovereign  thought.  He  suffered  himself 
to  be  sought  and  found  by  the  ardent  woman  of  Syro-Phenicia. 
Under  the  shadows  of  Ebal  and  Gerizim  he  opened  conversation 
with  the  woman  of  Samaria.  The  most  sympathetic  catholicity 
of  spirit  appears  in  his  life,  as  that  lies  before  us  in  the  New 
Testament,  giving  a  tender  majesty  to  his  words,  a  serene  and 
resplendent  benignity  to  his  action ;  as  the  sun-bright  radiance, 
according  to  the  story,  broke  through  and  suffused  the  woven 
threads  of  his  common  but  transfigured  dress.  But,  personally, 
his  ministry  was  almost  strictly  confined  to  the  Jews.  It  im- 
presses us  the  more,  then,  with  the  essential  breadth  of  his  re- 
ligion, with  the  value  it  attaches  to  all  human  souls,  that  the  in- 
stant force  of  it  should  have  been  such  on  the  minds  of  his  followers 
as  to  prompt  them  to  surpa??s  the  limits  of  his  example,  as  well 
as  utterly  to  transcend  the  teachings  Or  the  moral  suggestions  of 
the  Faith  before  o:overnino^  with  themselves  and  their  fathers. 
It  can  have  been  only  in  the  organic  structure  of  that  religion 
that  they  foimd  this  surprising  impulse — ratified,  however,  and 
clothed  with  emphasis,  by  the  closing  words  of  the  Master  to 
them,  as  reported  among  them,  and  by  the  last  gesture  which 
they  very  early  ascribed  to  him,  of  Benediction  on  the  earth, 
before  the  heavenly  cloud  received  him.  It  was  this  inherent 
energy  of  the  religion,  pushed  in  on  their  souls  with  incalculable 
force,  which  carried  them  abroad  in  world-wide  effort,  and  which 
made  all  distinctions  of  rank  or  power,  of  race  or  class,  disappear 
from  their  sight. 

The  new  light  thus  cast  on  the  value  and  greatness  of  human 
nature,  was  not  limited  to  them.  It  has  entered  since  into  the 
vital  consciousness  of  mankind.  It  is  to-day,  thanks  be  to  God ! 
the  broad  and  clear  illumination  of  the  world. 

On  the  face  of  it  this  religion  purported  to  be  one  which 
fiought  men,  and  sought  them  on  behalf  of  God,  to  bring  them 
to  Him.     It  was  not  a  religion  for  the  devout  only,  but  for  all 


A^O  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

men:  however  unintelligent  their  minds  might  have  been  on 
highest  themes,  however  refractory  and  rebellious  their  wills 
against  the  precepts  of  a  supreme  righteousness.  And  it  was  by 
no  means,  in  its  own  contemplation,  a  religion  which  had  been 
constructed  by  men,  to  lift  them  nearer  to  heavenly  leveU.  The 
ethnic  religions,  in  their  best  and  most  attractive  aspect,  are 
such  religions  of  aspiration :  the  lower  ever  looking  up  to  the 
higher,  the  ignorant  creature  trying  to  find  the  unknown  Creator. 
In  an  early  Vedic  hymn,  translated  by  Max  Miiller,  after  affirm- 
ing as  wise  and  mighty  the  works  of  him  who  stemmed  asunder 
the  wide  firmaments,  the  poet  asks :  "  How  can  I  get  near  unto 
Yaruna  [Heaven]?  Will  he  accept  my  offering  without  dis- 
pleasure ?  When  shall  I  with  a  quiet  mind  see  him  propitiated  ? " 
So,  in  another  translated  passage  from  the  Zoroastrian  Avesta,  is 
shown  us  another  up-reaching  spirit :  "  I  ask  thee  to  tell  me  the 
truth,  O  Ahura !  Who  was  from  the  beginning,  the  Father  of 
the  pure  creatures?  Who  has  made  the  path  for  the  sun  and 
the  stars  ? "  *  There  had  been  traditions  among  the  Greeks  that 
in  the  prehistoric  times  the  gods  had  held  commerce  with  men. 
Hecataeus  of  Miletus  is  said  to  have  definitely  fixed  the  era  at 
which  they  ceased  to  intermarry  with  mortals,  in  the  9th  or  lOtb 
century  before  our  era.  The  feeling  continued  that  poets,  as 
Plato  expressed  it,  'might  often  still,  by  the  assistance  of  the 
Muses  and  the  Graces,  attain  truth  in  their  strains ';  f  that  their 
highest  works  were  indeed  to  be  attributed  to  a  possessing 
divinity.  But  there  was  nowhere  among  the  Greeks  any  con- 
ception of  a  positive  body  of  law  and  truth  declared  by  the  gods 
for  man's  acceptance.  It  would  have  seemed  scarcely  less  pre- 
posterous than  that  stars  should  be  sent  for  human  torches. 

But  Christianity  came,  professedly  at  least,  with  such  Divine 
discoveries  to  man  ;  and  it  claimed  to  come  with  illustrious  her- 
alding. If  men  conceive,  as  they  not  unfrequently  have  con- 
ceived, the  song  of  angels  over  Bethlehem  to  be  a  later  poetic 
legend,  without  any  sure  historical  warrant,  this  aspect  of  the 
Gospel  remains  still  evident ;  for  it  then  is  apparent  what  im- 


*  "  Science  of  Religion":  New  York  ed.,  1872,  pp.  110-111. 
\  ''Laws":  HI.,  682. 


INTRODUCED  BY   CHRISTIANITY,  SI 

pression  it  had  made  on  the  minds  of  its  disciples,  an  impression 
80  quick,  deep,  and  continuing,  that  it  was  afterward  spontane- 
ously expressed — or,  if  any  one  chooses,  was  expressed  with  a 
purposed  and  calculated  conformity  to  the  feeling  of  those  disci- 
ples— ^in  the  radiant  picture  of  the  Bethlehem  legend.  Their 
religion  claimed,  from  the  beginning,  not  to  be  a  product  of 
human  contrivance,  but  a  message  from  the  heavens  ;  in  which 
the  eternal  and  invisible  God,  who  had  made  man  in  His  image, 
spoke  to  His  creature,  to  bring  him  into  higher  communion  with 
Himself.  And  in  this  vast  initial  fact  was  plainly  involved,  to 
those  who  received  it,  a  supreme  affirmation  of  the  dignity  and 
worth  of  that  nature  in  man  to  which  a  message  so  august  had 
been  addressed. 

In  this,  Christianity  contrasted,  as  I  have  said,  the  highest 
philosophies  which  had  preceded,  while  it  was  utterly,  by  its 
constitution,  set  apart  from  the  prevalent  religions  of  the  world, 
Hellenic,  Buddhistic,  or  any  other;  but  it  corresponded  with, 
while  immensely  sui-passing,  that  earlier  system  upon  which  it 
was  suddenly  super-imposed.  The  Zeus  of  the  Greeks,  as  Mr. 
Grote  has  clearly  recognized,  in  his  highest  supremacy  was  not 
a  Law-maker,  but  a  Judge,  having  only  the  commanding  Divine 
functions  judicial  and  administrative.  The  whole  conception 
of  the  Deity  as  dictating  a  code  of  laws,  Mr.  Maine  declared, 
in  his  "  Ancient  Law,"  to  belong  to  a  range  of  ideas  compara- 
tively recent  and  advanced.*  But  the  grand  uplifting  and  edu- 
cating force  to  the  Hebrew  nation  always  had  been  their  fervent 
belief  that  God  had  given  a  Law  to  their  fathers  :  a  Law  which 
contemplated  high  character  in  them,  and  which  showed  impres- 
sively that  the  Sovereign  of  the  Universe  was  ever  at  hand,  tak- 
ing instant  cognizance  of  the  action  of  men,  and  of  the  spirit 
revealed  in  that  action,  and  certain  to  recompense,  in  this  life  or 
the  next,  according  to  their  obedience  to  Him.  It  might  well 
be  that  a  pursuing  fear  of  God  should  be  inspired  by  this  Divine 
Law.  It  might  well  be  that  life  should  appear  so  solemn  and 
momentous,  under  its  overshadowing  cloud  and  glory,  to  those 
morally  weak,  that  they  should  desire  the  easier  rule  of  enticing 


*  "Ancient  Law  ":  New  York  ed.,  1864,  p.  5. 


82  THS  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

idolatries,  confronting  their  austere  religion  from  Tyre  or  Da- 
mascus, in  Babylon  or  ISTineveh,  or  along  tlie  verdurous  banka 
of  the  Nile.  But  as  long  as  the  fact  remained  in  their  convic- 
tion that  such  a  Law,  holy  and  mandatory,  had  been  given  to 
them  of  God,  they  could  not  but  recognize  also  the  estimate 
thus  put  by  Him  upon  their  nature.  That  Law  of  which  Kant 
said  that  'two  things  filled  his  soul  with  profound  awe,  the 
starry  heavens  and  the  moral  Law,'  had  at  any  rate  this  contin- 
ual mission.  Over  everj-  Hebrew  household  and  heart  shone  a 
gleam  from  the  Sinai  brightness.  Over  the  whole  history  of  the 
people  fell  a  force  of  unition  and  benediction  from  that  unfor- 
gotten  revelation  of  God.  In  the  highest  political,  as  in  the 
-deepest  moral  sense,  that  Law  was  their  life ;  because  it  ever- 
more quickened  the  sense  of  their  public  value  as  a  people,  of 
their  importance,  commensurate  with  their  duties,  as  persons 
before  God.  Other  nations  might  be  richer,  more  famous,  more 
powerful,  with  vaster  military  resource  and  skill,  capable  of  con- 
quering and  plundering  them,  of  deporting  them  from  their 
land,  or  of  grinding  them  into  the  dust  within  it.  But  no  other 
nation,  to  their  apprehension,  had  been  so  sought  of  God  as  had 
theirs.  In  all  the  wisdom  of  the  Egyptians  it  was  not  recited 
that  the  Eternal  himself  had  bended  the  heavens  to  communicate 
His  thought  arid  paramount  will  to  those  who  had  lifted  the 
stately  columns  of  Memphis  or  Thebes.  The  Eoraan,  Greek, 
Assyrian,  Phenician,  had  no  such  record  of  Divine  intervention. 
The  nation  which  had  it  was  lifted  to  moral  supremacy  by  it. 
Its  will  was  strung  for  every  great  endurance  apd  effort,  as  long 
as  the  faith  of  this  continued.  When  the  alluring  Phenician 
idolatries  expelled  this  from  the  thought  of  Israel,  the  infected 
tribes  lost  vitality,  and  were  swept  into  far  Oriental  spaces,  as 
^  a  rolling  thing  before  the  whirlwind.' 

f  When,  then,  Christianity,  in  its  profounder  spiritual  signifi 
cance,  in  its  alleged  ampler  discovery  of  the  Infinite  Mind, 
claiming  the  same  Divine  origin,  purporting  to  be  a  more  efful- 
gent final  message  from  the  supernal  spheres  of  light — when 
this  came  to  men,  and  challenged  their  faith,  the  same  impres- 
sion which  before  had  been  made  of  the  worth  of  the  special 
Hebrew  nature  was  reinforced,  and  capitally  augmented,  as  ap- 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITT.  83 

plied  thenceforth  to  all  men,  to  whom  peace  had  been  offered, 
with  the  Divine  blessing  on  men  of  good-will.  An  impression 
of  the  dignity  before  angels  and  God,  of  that  spirit  in  man  to 
which  this  religion  was  addressed,  was  inseparable  from  it,  in 
the  minds  of  its  disciples.  N^o  matter  whether  one  were  em- 
peror or  servant,  could  utter  his  thought  in  the  flexile  and  ex- 
quisite Attic  tongue,  or  could  only  harshly  stammer  it  forth  in 
the  hardly  intelligible  barbarian  jargon,  if  God  was  suflBciently 
interested  in  him  to  address  to  him  a  religion  like  this,  his  soul 
was  ennobled  and  crowned  by  the  fact.  That  touch  of  Divine 
recognition  of  his  nature  stamped  it  as  royal. 

But,  still  further,  this  religion  purported,  and  was  believed,  to 
have  come  from  God  in  fulfilment  of  a  plan  fully  indicated  be- 
fore, after  an  immense  and  prolonged  preparation.  It  was  be- 
lieved to  contain  amazing  elements,  of  miracle,  theophany,  ac- 
complished prophecy,  and  to  have  for  the  central  personage  in 
it  a  Being  of  celestial  nature  and  power,  whom  it  was  at  least 
lawful  to  worship,  and  whose  appearance  on  the  earth  made  the 
supreme  epoch  in  its  history.  It  is  not  now  essential  to  in- 
quire whether  these  convictions  were  just  or  not.  The  point  to 
which  I  call  your  attention  is  the  fact  that  such  convictions  were 
entertained,  at  what  all  must  admit  an  early  date ;  and  that 
their  necessary  influence  was  to  enlarge  and  quicken  the  general 
conception  of  the  man  for  whom  a  religion  so  transcendent  had 
been  proclaimed. 

According  to  its  immeasurable  greatness  must  be  the  great- 
ness, in  native  constitution,  in  worth  of  being,  of  him  for  whose 
acceptance  it  divinely  appealed.  Even  men  would  not  build 
jostly  ships  to  carry  sea-sand  from  Sidon  or  Ascalon,  and  drop 
it  into  the  deep;  but  only  to  carry  wealthy  fabrics,  products  of 
art,  or  treasures  of  looms,  between  the  rich  commercial  cities. 
Even  men  would  not  send  armed  legionaries  to  conquer  rabbits, 
or  capture  mice.  Always  there  must  be  a  certain  proportion  be- 
tween means  employed  and  ends  desired  ;  between  benefits 
proffered,  and  the  accredited  worth  of  the  recipient.  And  if  it 
were  true,  as  they  assuredly  held  it  to  be  true,  that  God  had  sent 
His  Son  to  the  world,  by  teaching,  life,  and  the  mystery  of 
death,  to  draw  men  to  new  relations  to  the  Highest,  then  he 


84  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

must  be  worthy — the  man  for  whom  all  this  had  been  done — of 
Divine  regard ;  and  then  for  man  to  overlook  or  deny  his  per^ 
Bonal  value,  or  to  magnify  the  transitory  accidents  of  his  position 
above  the  intrinsic  worth  of  his  spirit,  was  to  impeach  the 
eternal  wisdom.  Precisely,  in  other  words,  as  the  primitive  con- 
ception  of  Christianity  was  higher  in  the  minds  of  its  disciples,, 
their  impression  was  more  complete  of  the  grandeur  of  that 
moral  nature  in  man  to  which  it  appealed.  As  a  scheme  of 
ethics,  a  human  philosophy,  the  theory  of  a  sensitive  and  skilled 
!N^azarene,  it  could  not  have  urged  a  power  of  this  sort  on  their 
minds.  As  a  Divine  revelation  of  duty  and  truth,  as  it  to  them 
plainly  appeared,  made  with  miracle,  preceded  by  a  vast  and 
majestic  preparation,  and  consummated  in  the  marvellous  advent 
and  work  of  a  Person  celestial — it  was  inevitable  that  it  should 
impress  them  with  the  conviction  that  he  for  whom  it  was  de. 
signed  had  possibilities,  if  not  prophecies,  in  his  nature,  which 
made  him  worthy  of  Divine  contemplation.  The  inference  was 
immediate  ;  the  impulse  which  it  gave  immense  and  new. 

Yet  further,  of  course  the  particular  provisions  of  this  religion, 
as  they  apprehended  them,  wrought  with  a  silent  consistent  en- 
ergy toward  the  same  unique  and  fruitful  impression.  They  all 
appeared  distinctly  to  imply,  to  those  who  accepted  them,  the 
inestimable  worth  of  the  nature  of  man,  and  the  infinite  su- 
premacy of  the  living,  thinking,  aspiring  spirit,  above  any  '^.on- 
comitants  of  language  or  race,  of  property  or  poverty,  obscurity 
or  power.  I  have  nothing  to  say  here  of  the  special  contents  of 
the  religion  about  which  there  may  be  diversities  of  opinion,  but 
only  of  those  aspects  of  it  which  lie  on  its  surface,  and  which 
none  will  dispute. 

The  appeal  was  made  by  it,  as  they  understood  it,  to  man,  to 
each  man,  to  change  his  course  and  his  purpose  in  life,  in  the 
exercise  of  his  personal  sovereignty  of  will,  under  the  influence 
of  invisible  motives  appealing  purely  to  his  moral  sensibility,  and 
under  a  subtile  spiritual  force  proceeding  directly  from  God 
himself.  The  captain  of  troops  might  disregard  such  a  will  in 
man,  and  treat  it  as  the  foolishest  impediment  and  impertinence. 
The  rich  patrician  might  no  more  consult  it,  in  one  slave  or  in 
«i]l,  than  he  regarded  the  slight  invisible  pulsations  of  the  ai/ 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  85 

through  which  his  litter  was  borne  by  his  attendants :  and  this, 
although  it  well  might  be  that  these  slaves,  captured  in  war,  or 
purchased  of  pirates,  were  of  an  ancestry  nobler  than  his,  of  a 
spirit  as  high,  and  of  rarer  accomplishments.  They  had  not 
power.  Subjects  of  violence,  or  victims  of  defeat,  they  had 
been  bought  from  the  slippery  deck,  or  on  some  bloody  disas- 
trous field,  for  a  few  sesterces  each  :  and  thenceforth  their  right 
to  a  personal  will  was  no  more  practical  than  their  right  to  carry 
the  suns  in  their  hands.  They  were  as  cattle,  as  the  dead,  be- 
fore their  lord.  The  master's  will  was  the  law  of  their  life. 
The  emperor's  will  was  the  law  of  the  State:  before  which  re 
luctant  wills  must  yield,  as  the  stems  which  the  tempest  bends 
or  breaks.  Even  in  the  ideal  philosophy  of  Plato,  the  common- 
wealth is  the  organism  for  which  and  by  which  the  individual 
exists,  to  which  his  personal  will  is  subject,  even  in  matters  like 
marriage,  or  worship,  or  the  training  of  children.  lN"o  one  should 
dare  to  publish  a  song,  though  sweet  as  the  golden  tones  of 
Orpheus,  if  it  had  not  been  approved  by  the  guardians  of  the 
laws. 

But  when  the  supreme  author  of  Christianity  proclaimed  his 
illustrious  religion  to  the  world — according  to  the  conception 
of  its  earliest  disciples — he  solicited  for  it  the  voluntary  accept- 
ance of  each  human  person  to  whom  it  came.  He  regarded  no 
chain,  excepted  from  his  commands  no  human  station,  and 
brushed  away  the  meshes  of  Stoical  necessity  with  an  unswerving 
hand.  He  set  before  each  man  good  and  evil,  that  he  might 
choose.  He  adnaonished  and  attracted  him,  by  a  vast  and  mani- 
fold variety  of  motives,  delicate  yet  august,  to  give  up  idolatry 
and  accept  the  new^  Faith,  or  to  come  out  from  the  narrower 
system  of  Moses  into  the  ampler  lii)erty  of  Christ:  in  either  case, 
to  turn  his  life  into  new  courses,  and  accept  for  himself  sublimest 
aims.  But  always  he  applied  for  men's  assent,  and  did  not  over- 
bear them  with  even  heavenly  force.  Faith  must  be  free.  Conse* 
cration  is  the  chiefest  volition  of  a  soul.  A  man's  destiny  turns  on 
his  own  election.  The  intrinsic  sovereignty  of  a  will  to  be  de- 
termined from  within,  not  to  be  controlled  by  mechanical  pressures, 
is  always  recognized  by  Christianity.  As  a  Person,  its  author 
spoke  as  to  a  person,  to  the  humblest  hearer  to  whom  came  hia 


so  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

message  by  evangelist  or  apostle ;  and  the  intrinsic  dignity  of 
the  soul  thus  addressed  could  need,  to  the  believer,  no  other 
demonstration.  Humanity  was  recognized  by  this  religion  as 
having  its  centre  above  itself :  but  it  was  appealed  to,  to  relate 
itself  freely,  in  an  intimate  way,  with  the  eternal  and  sovereign 
Spirit.  Each  created  soul  took  a  strange  majesty  on  its  native 
constitution  from  such  a  winning  and  animating  appeal  of  God 
himself,  as  represented  by  Jesus,  for  its  free  choice. 

Still  further  was  this  Impression  enforced  by  all  the  frame  of 
that  religion  whose  primary  appeal  was  so  replete  with  Divine 

/  persuasions.  It  took  for  granted  in  every  man  the  conscience  of 
right,  to  which  instruction,  precept,  rebuke,  were  properly  ad- 
dressed, and  which  must  respond  to  a  manifested  righteousness,, 
however  passion,  habit,  desire,  might  fight  against  this.  There 
had  been  no  instruction,  either  mental  or  moral,  in  the  ethnic 

\  religions.  Preaching,  of  any  sort,  was  simply  unknown,  unless- 
we  except  the  Buddhist  teaching,  which  instructed  men  to  ex- 
tinguish desire  in  order  to  arrive  at  non-existence.  Festal  -cere- 
monies, sacrifices,  augury,  were  under  the  Western  systems  the 
whole  of  religion.  Cicero  thought  of  philosophy,  as  I  have  said, 
but  never  of  religion,  as  a  helper  to  morality  and  wisdom.  He 
based  no  precepts  of  virtue  on  the  authority,  will,  or  example  of 
the  gods :  and  while  he  looked  perhaps  for  conservation  of  in- 
terests, he  never  expected  spiritual  culture  from  the  most  elaborate 

^  rites  of  worship.  But  Christianity  was  a  system  which  lived 
by  preachings  to  the  judgment  and  conscience.  The  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  has  always  been  conceded  a  central  and  cardinal  fac- 
tor in  it,  by  those  who  have  disputed  almost  everything  else: 

V  and  this  had  its  only  possible  power  through  its  appeal  to  man's 
apprehension  of  what  is  morally  beautiful  and  binding. 

/  It  has  sometimes  been  affirmed  that  much  which  is  most  im- 
pressive in  it  had  before  been  taught,  by  other  teachers,  Jewish 
oi  foreign ;  that  in  the  maxims  of  Seneca,  in  the  analects  of 
Confucius,  or  in  the  Buddhist  '  Path  of  virtue,'  we  find  paral- 
lels to  its  precepts.  It  is  not  in  the  least  needful  to  my  purpose 
to  inquire  whether  this  is  correctly  represented.  If  it  is,  the 
more  amazing,  certainly,  becomes  the  unique  and  stupendous 
personality  in  him  who  gave  to  such  spiritual  maxims,  elsewhere 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  87 

ineffective,  a  swift  and  nnprophesied  dominance  among  men  ;  f 
who  lifted  to  a  height  overtopping  the  world  the  radiant  orb  of 
which  other  elect  and  eminent  spirits  had  caught  vanishing 
beams.  But  it  surely  must  be  granted,  by  the  most  utter  scep- 
tic, that  the  precepts  and  promises  of  that  august  Sermon  be- 
longed to  the  religion  which  was  propagated  afterward  through 
the  compass  of  the  empire ;  and  each  of  these  precepts,  with  the 
promise  that  attends  it,  made  its  appeal,  directly,  energetically, 
to  the  moral  in  man — to  awaken  it  if  sleeping,  to  train  and  di- 
rect it  if  already  responsive. 

It  was  not  by  indulging  human  desire,  though  for  the  most  x 
enticing  pleasures  ;  it  was  not  by  flattering  human  ambition,  the 
Hebrew  pride,  the  Roman  craving  for  further  conquest,  the 
Greek  aspiration  for  achievements  in  art ;  it  was  by  setting  the 
sovereign  conscience  in  every  man  on  its  own  side,  in  the  face 
of  whatever  fought  against  it,  that  Christianity  won  its  early 
triumphs.  It  took  it  for  granted  that  every  man  to  whom  it 
spoke  had  the  moral  element  indestructible  in  him  ;  that  this 
could  be  taught  to  shudder  and  shrink  before  the  evil  which 
God  detests,  and  to  aspire  toward  the  holiness  immaculate  in 
which  is  His  joy ;  and  that  if  the  inner  and  linal  adhesion  of 
this  moral  nature  were  attracted  to  itself,  then  the  religion 
which  was  now  in  the  world  had  gained  its  disciple,  its  cham- 
pion, or  its  martyr.  It  must  be  apparent,  I  think,  that  no  form 
of  religion,  no  form  of  philosophy,  ever  honored  and  exalted  the 
moral  in  man  as  did  this  Faith  which  flung  its  whole  force  on 
the  deepest  and  keenest  sensibilities  in  that,  and  which  sought 
to  conquer  it  by  spiritual  persuasions.  It  only  signalizes  this 
characteristic  of  the  religion  of  the  Christ  that  when  Mohamme- 
danism, centuries  after,  appeared  suddenly  in  the  w^orld— that 
religion,  as  one  has  called  it,  '  of  fatal  apathy  and  of  sensual 
hopes ' — having  no  chance,  by  its  very  constitution,  to  appeal  to 
the  conscience,  it  could  only  argue  with  the  scimetar's  edge.         ^ 

It  took  for  granted  in  man,  too,  this  religion  of  Christ,  an  in- 
tellectual nature,  which  might  be  uncultured,  rudi mental  in  de- 
velopment, but  which  was  capable  of  apprehending  great  truths, 
as  taught  by  an  accepted  Teacher,  and  which  had  in  it  such  pro 
found  aspirations  as  would  leave  it  undaunted  in  front  of  mys. 


88  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

teries  ;  only  inspired  by  truths  so  transcendent  that  for  the  pre.* 
ent  it  could  not  grasp  them.  There  is  no  attempt  to  multiply 
mysteries  in  the  New  Testament ;  but  neither  is  there  the  sliorht- 
est  attempt  to  simplify  any,  or  to  vacate  them  of  unsearchable 
elements.  Whether  there  be  a  Regeneration,  is  not  at  this  mo 
ment  a  question  for  us.  The  fact  is  indisputable  that  the  Chris- 
tian Scriptures  declare  such  a  thing,  and  do  not  undertake  to 
define  or  describe  it,  or  to  explain  the  coincidence  in  it  of  tha 
Divine  and  human  activities.  What  the  writer  of  the  Fourth 
Gospel  meant  by  his  amazing  proem,  has  been  strenuously  dis- 
puted ;  but  the  fact  that  it  stands  at  the  outset  of  that  book — 
the  most  spiritually  profound  in  human  literature — is  apparent 
to  all,  and  that  there  it  has  stood  from  the  earliest  time  in  the 
history  of  the  book.  Even,  then,  if  one  should  imagine  this 
Gospel  to  have  been  invented  a  century  or  more  after  the  death 
of  Christ — a  supposition  as  difficult,  I  think,  as  to  suppose  the 
Hudson  river  to  have  been  manufactured  by  the  water-mills  at 
Glenn's  Falls — it  shows  illustriously  what  the  religion  on  whose 
behalf  it  is  conceived  to  have  been  fabricated  had  done  for  its 
writer,  and  what  an  estimate  the  early  disciples  conceived  that 
religion  to  put  on  man's  intellect.  To  address  the  Timaeus  to 
artisans  of  Athens,  or  the  Nicomachean  Ethics  to  boys  in  the 
streets,  would  not  have  been  ascribing  an  equal  honor  to  the 
common  intellectual  nature  in  man. 

It  appealed  to  his  conscience,  this  new  religion.  It  sought 
by  all  pertinent  motives  to  persuade  and  fix  his  wavering  will. 
And  while  it  addressed  him  with  truths  so  simple  that  the  child 
may  understand  them,  with  a  royal  confidence  in  his  intrepid 
investigating  power  it  flung  mysteries  in  his  path,  to  be  stimu- 
lants, not  impediments,  to  his  faith.  ^  Come  up  hither,  and  I 
will  show  tLee  things  which  must  be  hereafter,'  said  the  voice, 
speaking  apparently  from  the  heavens,  to  the  seer  of  the  Apoca- 
lypse.* '  Come  up  hither,  and  I  will  teach  thee  what  as  yet 
thou  canst  not  understand,  what  some  time  or  other  shall  be  un. 
folded  to  thine  exalted  and  visioned  intelligence ' — that  is  always 
the  voice  of  Christianity  to  those  to  whom  its  messages  come 


*  Revelation  iv.  1. 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY,  89* 

It  spoke  thus,  at  the  outset ;  and  certainly  no  other  system  oi 
thought,  reh'gious  or  speculative,  ever  honored  the  mental  force 
in  man  more  highly  than  did  this^when  it  went  to  the  sailor, 
the  jailer,  the  slave,  to  Lydia  at  Philippi,  or  to  Damans  at 
Athens,  and  said,  *  Turn  from  your  old  life,  and  take  the  rule 
of  Christ  for  yours,  and  you  shall  be  led  into  a  grander  and 
more  intimate  knowledge  of  God  and  His  universe,  and  of  your 
essential  relations  to  both ';  for  the  intellect  in  you  is  capable  of 
all  this.  It  is  only  for  a  little  lower  than  that  of  angels ! '  No- 
where has  either  the  fineness  or  the  power  of  that  intellectual 
nature  in  man,  the  culture  of  which  in  the  elect  few  was  the 
glory  of  Greece,  been  so  vividly  recognized  as  by  this  religion, 
which  came  apparently  by  fishermen  and  peasants,  led  by  one 
from  a  workshop  of  Nazareth,  but  which  opened  unbounded 
realms  of  thought,  and  which  solicited  each  obscure  man  to 
think  for  himself  what  it  declared  the  thoughts  of  God. 

It  was  not  less  signal,  significant,  or  fruitful,  the  recognition 
which  was  given  by  this  religion  to  man's  intrinsic  capacity  for 
affection :  for  an  affection  transcendent,  toward  God  himself  as 
declared  by  Jesus,  and  toward  mankind  whose  nature  appeared 
revealed  in  him,  in  a  definite  outline,  yet  in  ideal  glory.  No  love 
for  the  gods  had  been  shown,  or  been  possible,  under  ethnic  re- 
ligions. The  philosopher  could  not  love  the  indefinite  and  im 
personal  principle  of  order  pervading  the  universe,  any  more 
than  he  could  love  atmospheres  or  oceans.  To  have  any  affection 
for  the  ruthless  or  frivolous  gods  of  the  mythologies  was  outside 
the  compass  of  human  aspiration.  But  since  the  new  tidings  of 
God  nad  come,  or  what  claimed  to  be  such,  this  new  and  sur- 
passing enthusiasm  of  the  soul  was  prompted,  demanded,  as  the 
natural  product  of  the  novel  religion.  A  love  toward  the  Infi- 
nite was  contemplated  by  it,  on  the  part  of  the  humblest  disciple- 
of  Jesus,  beside  which  all  other  affections  should  be  weak,  but 
from  which  they  should  take,  each  one,  a  higher  purity,  anrd  a 
fresh  consecration.  Filial  and  fervent,  it  was  to  be :  persistent 
in  energy,  and  of  passionate  intensity :  such  as  could  conquer 
pain  and  grief,  outlast  the  years,  survive  vicissitudes,  be  only 
more  mighty  in  the  midst  of  temptations,  be  only  supreme  in 
the  presence  of  Death.     Out  of  this  love  beneficence  should  flow^. 


90  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

as  the  stream  from  its  spring.  By  it  the  universe  should  be  il- 
lumined to  him  who  saw  God's  presence  in  it.  The  very  dis. 
solution  of  that  universe  should  not  be  able  to  break  or  shake  it, 
while  God  continued,  with  the  soul  for  His  adoring  subject. 

Here,  then,  was  recognized  a  capacity  in  man  before  un. 
sounded,  unsuspected ;  and  the  divinest  witness  was  given  to 
the  greatness  of  his  nature.  In  the  fulness  of  this  love  holiness 
consisted ;  and  however  men  have  quarrelled  with  that  supreme 
requirement  of  the  Sci-ipture,  in  both  the  Testaments,  ^  Be  ye 
holy,  sinee  God  is  holy,'  no  one  can  deny  that  it  contains  the  no- 
blest eulogy  on  human  nature,  in  its  constituent  moral  powers, 
which  was  ever  pronounced.  We  cannot  rival  God  in  power;  the 
angels  cannot ;  or  in  the  measureless  infinitude  of  His  knowl- 
edge. But  in  that  which  is  grander  than  power  or  knowledge, 
in  the  character,  of  sovereign  and  unspeakable  glory,  to  w4iich 
all  else  in  Him  is  subordinate,  men  are  required  by  this  religion 
to  rival  God :  through  perfect  love  to  be  as  holy  as  Himself:  as 
the  single  drop,  in  its  crystal  sphericity,  is  as  perfect  as  oceans ; 
as  the  single  sun-ray,  slanting  through  the  crevice,  is  as  perfect  in 
its  intrinsic  splendor  as  measureless  floods  of  the  solar  effulgence. 
The  slave  at  Corinth,  the  despised,  rebell'jus,  and  passionate 
Jew  in  the  Eoman  Ghetto  across  the  Tiber,  might  feel  that  this 
was  a  measure  of  character  as  far  surpassing  the  reach  of  his 
power  as  he  yet  knew  this — and  knew  not  the  grace  which 
might  assist  it — as  it  would  be  to  climb  on  star-beams  to  the 
sky,  or  to  take  up  the  piles  of  Lebanon  in  his  fingers.  But  he 
could  not  but  feel,  as  no  one  now  can  refuse  to  feel,  that  he  who 
presented  a  requirement  like  that,  put  immensest  honor  on  human 
nature ;  an  honor  simply  unparalleled  and  supreme.  To  have  of- 
fered man  a  garland  of  suns  would  not  really  have  attested  so  su- 
premely the  Divine  honor  put  upon  him. 

Of  course,  too,  it  lies  on  the  face  of  Christianity  that  it  rec- 
ognizes a  life  beyond  the  present :  a  life  which  is  not  mere  ex- 
istence prolonged,  and  modelled  after  the  earthly  fashion,  but 
life  in  a  fuller,  intenser  sense,  the  Zoe  of  the  Gospels,  full  of  vis- 
ion, gladness,  happy  fellowship  with  illumined  souls,  noble  serv- 
ice exhaustive  of  no  power,  communion  of  spirit  with  God  him- 
self.    This  was  not  a  thought  wholly  strange,  it  is  evident,  to  the 


INTRODUCED  BY  GHRmTIANITY.  91 

highest  preceding  philosophies.  Socrates  had  had  some  expecta- 
tion of  such  a  future,  though  not  positively  affirming  it,  and 
Baying,  in  sad  contrast  with  the  apostle,  '  whether  to  die  or  live 
is  better,  God  alone  knows.'  Plato  had  had  perhaps  more  lively 
thought  of  it,  in  harmony  with  his  higher  speculative  genius. 
But  Aristotle  left  no  testimony  concerning  it,  unless  negative  in 
its  character ;  and  Pericles,  in  the  famous  funeral  oration  which 
Thucydides  has  recorded,*  refers  to  the  glory  of  the  city  for 
w^hich  they  whom  he  was  celebrating  had  died,  to  the  undying 
praise  which  by  their  self-devotion  they  had  deserved,  to  the  noble 
sepulchre  in  which  they  had  gained  a  place  and  name,  the  whole 
Earth  being  the  sepulchre  of  illustrious  men — but  he  makes  no 
reference  whatever  to  any  experience  beyond  the  present  await- 
ing the  bravest  or  the  best.  Cicero  not  unfrequently,  and  always 
eloquently,  refers  to  a  possible  future  life,  though  he  found  no 
comfort  in  it  himself  when  friends  nad  died,  though  his  own 
hope  was  fixed  supremely  on  posthumous  fame,  and  though  he 
plainly  admits  the  alternative  that  if  souls  perish  in  death  they  are 
not  miserable.  Caesar  publicly  denied  it  in  the  Senate,  himself 
at  the  time  the  recognized  head  of  the  public  religious  system : 
and  he  was  confronted  by  no  earnest  protest,  but  only  by  a  smil« 
ing  or  sneering  indifference.  Seneca  doubted,  though  inclined  to 
expect  the  continuance  of  the  best  souls  till  the  coming  confla- 
gration. Pliny,  Lucretius,  Horace,  and  many  others,  represent 
the  disbelief,  sad  or  scornful,  which  practically  pervaded  the  an- 
cient world.  Even  the  honest  and  noble  Epictetus  saw  nothing 
probable  for  man  in  the  hereafter  but  dissolution  into  other 
elements. 

A  conscious  and  personal  future  life  was  therefore  at  the  best, 
it  was  with  the  highest,  what  it  has  been  to  sceptics  in  our  time, 
*  a  grand  Perhaps ':  while  the  general  mind  either  wholly  re- 
pulsed it,  or  look  of  it  this  pallid  impression,  that  if  there  were 
a  future  existence  it  was  gloomy  and  joyless,  in  which  the  dead 
vrere  ghostly  spectres  bewildered  in  the  dark,  from  which  they 
turned  longingly  back  toward  the  life  which  they  had  left, 
wishing  their  tombs  to  be  built  along  thronged  and  resounding 


♦  [L.  35-46 


'92  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

streets,'  having  even  their  sarcophagi  covered  with  sculpturea 
of  battles,  games,  and  other  eager  and  festal  activities ;  sometimea 
providing  for  feasts  of  friends,  to  be  held  at  intervals  in  their 
tombs.  In  other  instances  such  inscriptions  on  the  sepnlL'hrea 
as — *  I  was  not,  and  became ;  I  was,  and  am  not ';  '  To  eter- 
nal sleep';  'I  was  naught,  and  am  naught'; — show  how  en 
tirely  had  passed  from  many  minds  the  expectation  of  life,  in 
any  complete  and  superlative  sense,  beyond  the  grave.  In  re- 
gard to  this,  at  least,  the  striking  remark  of  Coleridge  is  exactly 
true,  that  "  across  the  night  of  Paganism  philosophy  flitted  on, 
like  the  lantern-fly  of  the  tropics — a  light  to  itself,  and  an  orna- 
ment, but,  alas!  no  more  than  an  ornament,  of  the  surrounding 
darkness."* 

Even  in  Egypt,  where  the  doctrine  of  a  future  existence,  cor- 
responding with  that  known  on  the  earth,  had  long  been  familiar, 
a  later  funeral  tablet  cited  by  Kenouf ,  speaks  of  it  as  '  a  land  of 
heavy  slumber  and  darkness,  an  abode  of  sorrow  for  those  who 
dwell  there,  where  father  and  mother  are  not  recognized,  and 
where  Death  Absolute  is  God.' 

It  has  been  persistently  disputed,  you  know,  among  those 
most  competent  to  discuss  it,  whether  the  hoped-for  Nirvana  of 
Buddhism  meant  annihilation  of  personal  consciousness,  or  simply 
an  utter  rest  of  the  spirit,  after  all  struggle  for  individual  ends 
should  have  ceased  to  be  made.  The  former  appears  the  more 
probable  opinion,  as  is  largely  and  elaborately  shown  by 
Burnonf.  The  highest  hope  cherished  by  the  system  seems 
clearly  to  have  been,  that 

"  dying  in  the  darkness  of  God's  light, 

The  soul  may  pierce  these  blinding  webs  of  Nature, 
And  float  up  to  the  Nothing  which  is  all  things:" 

while  all  agree  that  what  among  us  is  called  *the  soul,'  is  to 
Buddhism  simply  a  phantom.  But  the  fact  that  such  a  discus- 
sion has  been  possible  is  the  fact  here  significant.  For  no  one 
lias  doubted  that  Chnstianity  offered,  to  those  complying  with 
ita  conditions,  a  life  as  glorious  as  it  was  personal,  and  undefined 


'Aids  to  Reflection".  Aph.  IV.;  New  York  ed.,  1853,  Vol.  I.,  p.  225. 


INTBOBUCEB  BY  CHRIS TIAJSTITT.  93 

by  limits  of  time.  Men  have  quarrelled  with  it  often  for  stil. 
associating  with  that  life  the  old  body,  transfigured.  But  they 
have  not  doubted  that  it  promised  the  primary  life  of  the  spirit. 
They  have  sometimes  affirmed  that  it  promised  a  glorious  life  to 
all,  without  conditions ;  but  none  have  doubted  that  it  promised 
«uch  to  its  faithful  disciples ;  and  so,  anew,  it  exalted  immensely, 
beyond  computation,  the  practical  conception  of  the  nature  of 
man.  When  from  its  obscure  pulpit  in  Palestine  it  preached  the 
doctrine  of  unending  existence  awaiting  all — ^not  of  any  transmi- 
gration of  souls,  such  as  Egypt  and  India  had  constantly  tauglit, 
not  of  any  groping  and  shadowy  consciousness  such  as  the  poets 
had  associated  with  Hades — but  of  a  supreme  and  beautiful  ex- 
istence, for  all  whose  character  made  them  ready,  an  existence 
intense,  exuberant,  immortal — when  it  taught,  as  it  certainly 
taught  very  early,  the  real  resurrection  of  the  Lord  from  the 
dead,  and  his  amazing  ascension  to  the  Heavens,  as  a  pledge  and 
proof,  and  even  a  ground,  of  the  assurance  of  such  to  believers, 
— it  was  at  any  rate  bringing  a  force  to  operate  upon  men  to  ex- 
pand and  exalt  their  thoughts  of  man's  soul  such  as  no  preceding 
history  had  known. 

All  the  combined  supernatural  elements  which  the  early  dis- 
ciples discerned,  as  they  thought,  in  their  religion,  from  the  ad- 
vent of  the  Lord  to  his  last  appearance  to  Saul  of  Tarsus,  bore 
on  this  stupendous  result,  were  what  they  were  by  reason  of  it. 
For  this  it  was  that  a  Divine  Person,  as  they  conceived,  had 
come  to  the  world.  For  this,  he  had  taught,  endured,  according 
to  their  conviction  of  things  had  wrought  miracles,  and  had 
finally  died,  when  he  might  have  escaped,  or  might  have  re- 
sisted. For  this,  he  had  sent  the  Spirit  from  above,  that  the 
hearts  of  men  might  be  changed  within,  and  made  ready  to  rise 
to  spheres  of  light.  And  for  this  he  was  coming,  in  power  and 
splendor,  at  that  end  of  the  world  which  they  were  anticipating 
as  hot  distant,  to  call  the  saints  out  of  their  graves,  and  to  ap- 
point, as  men  had  deserved,  unending  destinies.  The  Cross  was 
only  interpreted  to  them  by  its  relation  to  this  supernal  and 
boundless  life,  which  the  soul  in  man  was  great  enough  to  de- 
sire, and  great  enough  to  receive.  The  Incarnation  took  its 
moral  glory  from  that  illustrious  and  immeasurable  end  toward 


94  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

which  it  had  come  to  help  men  forward.  Before  the  meanest, 
stretched  welcoming  and  triumphant  eternities.  The  soul  of 
the  slave  had  in  it  the  sovereignty  of  immortal  presages. 
Therefore  it  was  that  the  common  salutation  of  Christians  upon 
the  streets  was,  "  Christ  is  Eisen ! "  and  that  the  glorious 
Easter  anniversary — still  honored  in  our  churches — became  to 
them  a  festival  such  as  pagan  religions,  with  all  their  arts,  and 
all  their  ancientness,  never  had  known.  The  life  to  come,  the 
life  unending — that  was  its  word  of  strange  and  solemn  illu- 
mination ! 

To  those  who  do  not  find  the  evangelical  doctrines,  so  called, 
in  the  early  scheme  of  Christianity,  it  seems  probable  that  these 
were  elaborated  later,  possibly  by  the  unconscious  action  of  sub- 
sequent minds  constructing  a  basis  on  which  to  plant  such  tow- 
ering hopes.  But  those  who  accept  these  doctrines  as  primitive 
find  in  them  the  Divine  foundation  on  which,  from  the  first, 
those  hopes  were  builded.  The  hopes  themselves,  inspired  by 
Christianity,  and  opened  to  all  men  on  certain  conditions,  none 
can  dispute.  For  the  peasant,  the  soldier,  the  slave,  the  bar- 
barian, as  well  as  for  statesman,  artist,  philosopher,  there  lay,  in 
its  conception,  beyond  the  grave,  unbounded  existence,  which 
might  be  full  of  peace  and  praise,  which  opened  to  virtue  match- 
less areas,  and  gave  to  power  the  vivid  promise  of  indefinite  ex- 
pansion. Because  of  that,  the  new  religion  had  come  to  men ; 
because  of  that,  it  had  histories  behind  it,  vivid  with  prediction, 
majestic  with  miracle ;  because  of  that,  it  was  what  it  was  in  its 
own  transcendent  and  inspiring  constitution.  And  wheresoever 
this  was  apprehended,  with  loving  faith,  the  nature  of  the  man 
to  whom  such  a  religion  thus  had  spoken  was  lifted  to  an  emi- 
nence before  inconceivable  ;  deserving  the  regard  of  the  Infinite 
himself  ;  deserving  the  homage  of  every  man. 

Certainly,  no  other  eulogy  so  sublime  has  been  pronounced  on 
human  nature  as  that  which  was  thus  pronounced  by  Christi- 
anity, when  it  broke  into  the  history  of  the  world,  at  the  outset 
Df  our  era ;  which  is  implied  in  it  to-day,  wherever  its  astonish- 
ing messages  are  carried.  I  find  it  hard,  sometimes,  to  en- 
tertain sincere  respect  for  many  of  the  arguments  brought 
against  the  religion  which  has  changed  so  substantially  the  life 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRISTIANITY.  95 

of  the  world.  But  tJiat  one  which  seems  the  foolishest  of  all-- 
a  mere  mephitic  waft  of  air — is  tlie  allegation  which  occasionally 
is  made,  which  has  been  rampantly  made  in  our  time,  that  it  de- 
grades the  nature  of  man,  and  puts  too  low  an  estimate  upon  it ! 
How  soon  will  men  complain  that  showers  bring  drought,*and 
that  sunshine  makes  darkness  too  complete ! 

The  fact  that  Christianity,  hy  its  Master  and  his  disciples, 
condemns  man's  character  with  unsparing  severity,  and  makes 
his  want  of  inner  righteousness  the  reason  why  it  has  come  to 
change  him — that  it  shows  the  fiercest  passions  of  men  raging 
against  the  gentle  and  the  sovereign  Person  who  is  principal  in 
it,  and  that  it  predicts  results  of  evil,  vast  and  terrific,  as  certain 
to  flow  from  the  temper  of  malice,  lust,  unbelief — this  only  adds 
emphasis  to  the  tribute  which  it  organically  and  everywhere 
pays  to  the  greatness  of  man's  nature,  in  the  constituent  ele- 
ments of  that.  It  is  because  that  nature  is  so  grand,  in  possibility 
if  not  promise,  that  sin,  in  the  conception  of  this  religion,  as 
interpreted  by  its  early  disciples,  becomes  so  dreadful  in  power 
and  effect.  Heathenism  practically  knew  nothing  of  sin,  ex- 
cept as  consisting  in  neglect  or  refusal  of  certain  specific  rites  of 
religion.  Christianity  locates  the  element  of  it  in  the  want  ot 
supreme  affection  toward  God ;  in  the  failure  of  man  to  realize 
his  true  moral  ideal ;  in  his  want  of  harmony  with  the  spiritual 
Universe,  of  which  by  birthright  he  is  a  member.  Morally,  to 
the  ethnic  religions,  man  was  always  a  child  ;  to  be  punished  for 
negligence,  carelessness,  petty  wilfulness.  It  has  been  made  a  re- 
proach against  Christianity  that  it  treats  him  too  much  as  a  mag- 
nificent rebel,  not  the  servant  of  circumstances  or  a  client  of 
chance,  but  a  responsible  moral  person,  on  whom  God  lays  im- 
perative commands,  by  whom  those  commands  are  repulsed  and 
defied,  to  whom,  therefore,  comes  a  celestial  Person  to  conquer 
and  to  help.  I  am  not  now  concerned  to  inquire  whether  Christi- 
-anity  is  right  or  is  wrong  in  this  contemplation  of  man  as  a  sinner. 
I  only  point  out  the  fact  that  such  a  doctrine  of  sin  is  in  perfect 
harmony  with  all  that  teaching  by  which  it  magnifies  the  es- 
sential worth  of  the  soul  in  man.  In  the  contemplation  of 
Paul,  for  example,  it  was  because  man  was  constitutionally  great 
while  morally  depraved,  that  the  Lord  had  come  to  graft  in  his 


96  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

Bpirit  a  new  element  of  life.  In  the  contemplation  of  all  tbft 
New  Testament  immortal  recompenses  of  evil  or  of  good,  are 
not  too  much  for  the  soul  whose  powers  bear  the  image  of  God 
It  is  for  a  fallen  Prince  in  the  creation  that  battlements  of  doom 
face, gates  of  pearl  in  the  Christian  pre- vision. 

In  spite  of  sin,  man  is  honored  by  this  religion ;  of  course 
therefore,  in  spite  of  everything  else — poverty,  ignorance,  rude 
ness  of  manner,  distinctions  of  sex,  nationality,  race,  or  the 
servile  condition.  '  The  Good  Sans-Culotte,'  Jesus  was  called, 
ages  afterward,  by  the  French  Revolutionists ;  and  it  was  a  real 
glimpse  of  the  honor  which  the  Master  had  paid  to  the  poorest 
which  mingled  in  the  words  with  the  fierce  gleam  of  human 
passion.  From  no  rudest,  weakest,  or  most  oppressed  man  had 
the  Lord  turned  aside ;  and  no  such  man  could  hear  himself  ad- 
dressed by  the  new  religion,  from  Tabor  or  Olivet,  from  broken 
sepulchre  and  illuminated  heavens,  or  from  the  stern  summits  of 
a  prophesied  Judgment,  without  a  fresh  consciousness  of  the  rad- 
ical greatness  of  human  nature,  in  himself  and  in  others. 

But  the  final  expression  of  this  reverence  of  Christianity  for 
the  nature  in  man  is  shown  when  obscure  and  unlearned  persons 
— servants,  mechanics,  soldiers  from  the  ranks,  runaway  slaves, 
outcast  women — have  accepted  its  Lord,  as  preached  by  aj)ostles,, 
and  have  bowed  together  in  penitent  joy  before  darkened  cross 
and  golden  cloud.  Then  they  are  spoken  of,  in  all  tlie  New  Testa- 
ment, in  terms  surpassing  the  majesty  of  kings ;  and  their  scat- 
tered  and  seemingly  insignificant  societies  are  described  as  no 
orator  would  have  dared  to  picture  senate  or  city  in  the  proudest 
imperial  days  of  Rome.  They  have  been  purchased  by  the  blood 
of  Christ,  and  are  marching  together,  through  whatever  pain- 
ful or  toilsome  paths,  toward  the  place  which  he  is  prepar- 
ing on  high.  With  him  they  are  the  heirs  of  God,  the  sons 
and  daughters  of  the  Lord  Almighty ;  apostles,  prophets,  evac- 
gelists,  pastors,  all  are  for  them,  that  they  may  be  brought,  by 
the  Divine  Spirit,  to  the  measure  of  the  stature  of  the  fulness  of 
Christ.  They  are,  in  their  collective  unity,  a  spiritual  House,  a 
holy  Priesthood,  the  very  Body  on  earth  of  him  to  whom  all 
things  are  being  subjected.  By  them  is  to  be  made  known  to 
principalities  and  powers  in  heavenly  places  the  manifold  wisdom 


INTRODUCED  BT  CHRISTIANITY,  97 

'of  Him  on  whose  word  the  universe  rests.  The  church  on  earth 
is  one  with  that  enthroned  on  high,  the  immaculate  and  im- 
mortal Elide  of  Christ.  In  its  linal  supremacy,  the  new  Jerusa- 
lem will  have  descended  out  of  heaven  from  God,  having  upon 
it  the  glory  of  God. 

1^0  matter  what  one  may  conceive  of  all  this  —  though  it 
seem  to  him  a  folly  suq^assing  all  "  the  foolishness  of  preach- 
ing " — ^he  cannot  but  recognize  the  estimate  thus  put  on  the  com- 
mon mysterious  nature  of  man.  For  the  first  time  in  the  world 
were  recognized  here  the  abysmal  secrets  of  that  moral  being  to 
which  is  possible  a  mighty  love,  surpassing  knowledge,  such  as 
glorified  men  like  Paul  and  John,  and  afterward,  in  humbler  disci- 
ples, brightened  the  cell,  and  quenched  the  flame :  to  which  is 
possible  also  a  malignity  like  that  which  had  flamed  to  intensest 
exhibition  before  the  majestic  presence  of  the  Christ.  Here,  for 
the  first  time,  were  presented  to  the  world  possibilities  on  the 
one  hand  of  such  transcendent  and  ravishing  hopes  that  language 
rushes  into  rhapsody  to  describe  them,  and  on  the  other  hand  of 
such  remorseful  gloom  and  despair  that  one  immersed  in  their 
mystery  of  pain  is  as  if  dashed  *  from  heights  of  glory  above  the 
empyrean,  to  a  depth  so  low  that  the  floor  of  hell  might  be  its 
zenith.'  The  pathos  and  the  majesty  of  that  conception  of 
man  which  pervades  the  New  Testament  no  human  thought 
had  measured  or  apprehended  till  it  fell  upon  the  world  from 
the  life  and  the  lips,  and  the  consummating  death,  of  him  of 
Nazareth.  If  this  conception  is  not  correct,  Christianity  is  in 
^rror,  from  the  root  upward.  If  this  is  correct,  the  glory  of  that 
-ever-living  religion  which  taught  it  to  the  world  seems  as  appar- 
ent as  the  splendor  of  Uriel  sitting  amid  the  sun's  bright  circle. 
That  the  Divine  nature  should  have  been  combined  with  the 
human  in  the  Person  of  the  Lord  seemed  not  too  astounding  to 
be  believed  by  the  early  teachers  of  this  religion. 

I  am  sure  that  I  need  not  argue  before  you  that  this  changed  and 
ennobled  conception  of  Man  has  been  of  immense  and  fruitful 
power.  It  came^  as  I  trust  you  will  feel  that  I  have  shown,  not 
accidentally,  but  as  associated  organically  with  the  religion  which 
we  are  considering :  involved  in  that,  as  the  heat-ray  in  the  solar 
<ight-ray.  It  came  to  stay.  It  has  widened  in  the  world,  pre- 
7 


98  THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN, 

cisely  in  the  measure  in  which  this  religion  has  had  purer  devel 
opinent,  larger  swaj.  Of  course  the  ambition  and  selfishness  ol 
men  have  fought  against  it,  with  fierce  and  often  successful  re- 
sistance. Of  course  forms  of  religion,  called  Christianity,  but 
wanting  its  primitive  tendency  and  spirit,  have  overlooked  oi 
denied  this  conception  of  man,  and  have  delivered  hirn  over — 
even  him  for  whom  this  religion  had  come — to  the  blindness  of 
ignorance,  to  the  torpor  which  comes  with  want  of  hope,  to  the 
hopeless  hardness  of  servile  toil.  The  world  is  not  yet  Christian  ; 
and  the  worst  reproaches  which  the  Faith  brought  by  Jesus  has 
had  to  bear,  as  I  suggested  before,  have  come  from  the  work 
of  selfish  passions,  skulking  beneath  the  Christian  name.  Bui 
that  sublimer  conception  of  man  which  emanated  from  him— 
nobler  than  Roman,  Greek,  Assyrian,  or  the  earlier  Hebrew — 
did  not  fail  at  the  outset,  in  the  terrible  struggle  to  get  itself  es- 
tablished; and  it  has  not  failed  since.  Set  Chrysostom's  elo- 
quence against  Cicero's,  and  you  see  it ;  or  the  first  epistle  cred- 
ited to  Clement,  against  any  philosophical  fragment  of  Seneca. 
Set  the  admitted  equality  of  members  in  the  earliest  Christian' 
congregations  of  the  catacombs  against  the  haughty  distinctions 
between  classes  in  the  empire  above  them,  and  you  cannot  but  see- 
it.  Out  of  it  came  the  philanthropical  endeavors  which  glorified 
the  earliest  years  of  the  church  ;  out  of  it,  the  strong  missionary 
impulse,  which  drew  from  it  ever-fresh  inspiration.  It  erected 
the  son  of  the  Gallic  prefect  in  unbending  severity  before  the- 
imperial  Theodosius.  It  made  the  son  of  the  Tuscan  carpenter  the 
lord  of  the  Middle  Age  Christendom.  It  became  the  germ  of 
future  freedoms,  authorizing  the  idea  which  is  now  organifie  in 
the  structure  of  Governments,  that  they  exist  for  the  individual, 
not  he  for  them.  And  the  emperors  who  pursued  it  with  swoi'd 
and  flame  were  right  in  feeling  that  they  or  it  had  got  to  go- 
down  in  that  awful  duel. 

The  whole  public  life  of  the  world,  so  far  as  Christianity  af- 
fected that  life,  took  sudden,  impulsive,  and  powerful  start  from* 
the  nobler  influence  thus  breaking  into  it.  The  old  weariness- 
departed,  of  which  ancient  biographies  give  examples  most  touch- 
ing and  impressive.  The  old  thought, ever  recurring,  'Better  it 
were  t  >  die  early ;  best  of  all,  not  to  have  been  boru '    the  old 


INTRODUCED  BY  CHRmTIANITY,  99 

feeling,  expressed  by  the  Stoics,  that  *  the  aim  of  philosophy  ia 
to  despise  life ':  the  old  sad  tendency  which  made  life  cheapo  and 
suicide  familiar : — these  vanished  in  the  light  of  the  new  religion, 
as  mists  before  auroral  splendors,  when  men  whose  horizon  had 
seemed  limited  inexorably  to  the  small  and  uncertain  attain- 
ments  of  time,  were  inspired  to  look  on  to  a  Future  beyond,  un- 
bounded as  the  sky,  and  brighter  than  that  when  sunshine  fills 
it.  A  gleam  from  the  Immensities  shot  sacredness  over  life. 
An  imdertone  from  Eternal  relations  was  thenceforth  beneath 
men's  common  speech. 

Never  has  passed  that  new  and  vast  impulse  from  the  life  of 
the  world.  The  religion  which  had  shown  God  to  mankind,  so 
as  before  He  had  not  been  conceived,  the  same  religion  showed 
Man  to  himself,  so  as  before  he  had  not  been  imagined,  in  the 
greatness  of  his  nature,  in  his  immortality.  In  regard  to  this 
conception  of  the  soul,  its  dignity  and  worth,  the  race  has  been 
a  new  one,  since  Jesus  taught  it,  and  so  far  as  his  religion  has 
gone.  And  it  is  upon  that  sublime  conception  introduced 
by^  Christianity,  justified  and  verified,  as  they  surely  believed 
who  first  received  it,  by  prophecy  and  by  miracle,  which  has 
ever  since  been  building  itseK  into  the  public  life  of  the  world — 
it  is  upon  that,  that  we  stand  to-day  in  utter  tranquillity,  when 
materialism  affirms  that  man  is  a  fabric  of  wind  and  ashes,  whose 
whole  life  is  evolved  from  the  brutal ;  when  even  a  scholarly 
scepticism  says  that  ^  the  last  enemy  which  speculative  criticism 
has  to  destroy  is  the  belief  in  a  future  life ';  or  when  the  meta- 
physical moralist  declares,  in  the  sad  tone  of  Stuart  Mill,  that 
*  man  is  naturally  a  lover  of  dirt,  a  sort  of  wild  animal  craftier 
than  the  other  beasts,  to  whom  the  most  criminal  actions  are  not 
more  unnatural  than  most  of  the  virtues,  and  to  whom  the  im- 
aginative  hope  of  futurity  may  be  more  a  burden  than  a  bless, 
ing/  Such  philosophic  pessimism,  in  our  own  time,  from  a 
robust  and  gallant  spirit,  seems  the  only  thing  needed  to  make 
vnost  illustrious  that  radiant  conception  of  the  essential  greatness 
of  man's  nature  which  came  by  Jesus. 


LEOTUKE    IV 


THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE   DUTY  OP  MAN 
TOWARD  GOD,  IN  WORSHIP. 


LECTURE  IV. 

In  passing  from  the  etbnic  religions,  ancient  or  modern,  into 
Christianity,  or  in  advancing  to  it  from  the  more  rubrical  sys- 
tem of  the  Hebrews,  it  seems  impossible  not  to  feel  that  we 
come  suddenly  into  a  freer  and  more  spiritual  conception  of  that 
personal  duty  of  man  toward  God  which  is  expressed  by  the 
tender  and  lordly  historical  word  Worship;  and  when  we  re- 
member how  closely  and  how  largely  this  is  related  to  the  mental 
and  moral  advancement  of  mankind,  to  what  an  extent  the 
highest  spiritual  life  of  the  world  is  determined  or  modified  by 
its  energetic  educating  force,  it  certainly  will  not  seem  that 
the  change  thus  accomplished  is  insignificant.  Indeed,  I  think 
that  the  more  we  reflect  on  it  the  more  deeply  shall  we  feel  how 
profound,  radical,  far-extending  it  is,  and  how  much  it  implies 
concerning  the  religion  to  which  it  is  due  ;  what  a  light  it  casts 
on  the  sovereign  authorship  of  that  system  of  Faith  which  came 
by  Jesus.  I  would  not  exaggerate  anything  here,  more  than 
elsewhere;  but  to  me  there  appear  profound  significance  and 
incalculable  importance  in  the  change  thus  inaugurated.  It 
looks,  at  least,  like  a  wholly  new  and  sublimer  force  breaking  in 
upon  the  previous  context  of  history,  to  quicken  and  lift,  in  a 
method  and  a  measure  both  unparalleled,  the  moral  activity  and 
life  of  mankind. 

It  is  manifest,  at  once,  that  Christianity  insists,  as  strongly  as 
any  religion  in  the  world,  on  the  duty  of  man  to  offer  a  true 
worship  to  God.  Whatever  indifference  there  may  have  been 
toward  this  on  the  part  of  philosophers,  as  we  know  there  was 
much  both  in  the  Greek  and  the  Roman  society,  there  was  none 
whatever  on  the  part  of  the  earliest  teachers  of  Christianity 
Whatever  carelessness  of  it  there  was  among  the  peoples,  in 
whom  faith  in  the  gods  had  largely  decayed — to  whom  customs 

(103) 


104     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

of  worship  had  often  become  a  matter  of  fashion,  of  civil  regii 
lation,  of  artistic  pleasure,  of  family  festivity,  or  sometimes  of 
riotous  debauch — there  was  no  reserve,  and  no  incredulity,  about 
the  supreme  function  of  worship,  in  the  small  assemblies  of 
Christian  disciples  gathered  by  the  first  preaching  of  their  re- 
ligion. The  testimony  of  Christians,  and  of  the  adherents  to 
antagonist  rituals,  agree  on  this  point;  and  the  younger  Pliny's 
report  to  Trajan,  forty  years  after  the  death  of  St.  Paul,  shows 
how  widely,  in  villages  as  in  cities,  what  be  regarded  as  a  de- 
praved and  excessive  superstition  had  gathered  its  companies  and 
developed  its  cultus. 

To  those  accustomed  to  the  sumptuous  and  sounding  pageants 
of  heathenism  it  may  easily  have  seemed  that  the  Christian  dis- 
ciples, meeting  privately  before  the  dawn  to  sing  hymns  to  the 
Christ,  and  to  partake  in  the  breaking  of  bread,  had  no  appro- 
priate or  significant  worship.  To  those  long  trained  in  the 
Hebrew  economy — with  its  annual  feasts,  its  sacrifices  and  pro- 
cessions, its  girdled,  mitred,  and  breast-plated  priests — it  might 
seem  as  if  those  who  professed  the  new  Faith  had  left  not  the 
ancient  ritual  only,  but  all  commanding  forms  of  worship,  and 
had  gone  into  fellowship  with  Pyrrhonic  philosophers,  or  with 
the  rude  and  careless  rabble.  Traces  of  such  impressions  are 
not  wanting  in  the  first  Christian  centuries;  and  it  may  have 
been  an  incredulity  of  this  sort,  quite  as  much  as  a  ribald  scorn, 
which  was  expressed  in  the  ancient  graphite  scratched  on  the- 
wall  of  a  vault  on  the  Palatine — if  the  reference  of  it  to  the 
Christ  be  conceded — representing  the  Lord  as  a  crucified  man, 
with  an  ass's  head,  and  the  words  beneath,  in  rude  characters, 
"  Alexamenos  worships  his  God."  But  Christians  knew  the 
realness  of  their  worship,  as  well  as  its  object ;  and  both  Hebrew 
and  heathen  discovered  their  mistake  when  all  the  authority  of 
ruler  and  priest,  with  the  desperate  and  continuing  violence  of 
the  empire,  proved  unavailing  to  break  up  the  assemblies  in- 
which  the  disciples  communed  and  adored. 

To  offer  this  worship  was  not  with  them  a  mere  duty  of  obe- 
dience  to  external  precepts,  though  these  were  not  wanting.  It 
was  still  more  an  instinct  of  the  heart :  an  instantaneous  and 
necessary  impulse  of  their  entire  Christian  consciousness.     And 


TOWARD   GOB,  IN  WORSHIP.  105 

if  the  gospels  were  now  lost  from  our  knowledge,  we  might  almost 
reproduce  them  from  the  primitive  customs  of  the  disciplea 
60  far  as  to  put  again  into  the  sovereign  lips  of  the  Lord  those 
kingly  words,  *  Worship  God !  "Worship  Him,  in  spirit  and 
in  truth  1 '  As  fully  as  either  words  or  example  can  impress 
any  duty  on  man,  the  whole  scheme  of  Christianity  impresses  the 
duty  of  devout  adoration  to  the  Most  High.  If  any  fail  to 
accept  this  duty,  they  stand  outside  its  impulse  and  rule. 

But,  evidently,  there  are  important  particulars  in  which  the 
worship  commanded  by  Christianity,  and  by  which  it  was  dis- 
tinguished in  the  world,  differs  from  any  which  had  preceded 
it ;  and  except  as  we  apprehend  these  differences,  and  feel  the 
vital  consequence  of  them,  we  shall  not  see  what  a  work  it  ac- 
complished in  this  direction,  or  what  prophecies  are  in  it  of  the 
future  spiritual  culture  of  man.  At  the  very  beginning,  it  recog- 
nized no  further  need  on  man's  part  for  the  offering  of  sacrifice, 
of  bird,  or  beast,  or  the  fruits  of  the  earth — that  by  this  he  might 
appease  the  gods  or  win  their  favor,  or  that  by  it  he  might 
fulfil  the  law  which  had  come  to  the  Hebrews  through  their 
fathers.  Nothing  more  radical,  apparently  revolutionary,  can 
well  be  conceived  than  this  immense  and  startling  liberation  by 
the  new  religion,  of  all  its  disciples,  from  the  solemn  ancestral 
ritual  of  Sacrifice.  This,  at  least,  can  hardly  have  been  sug- 
gested by  any  calculations  of  human  prudence,  or  any  impulse 
of  a  trained  and  responsive  Jewish  sensibility.  It  traversed  all 
custom,  appeared  to  dishonor  the  most  sacred  memories,  to  con- 
tradict the  very  instinct  of  penitence,  if  not  to  contradict  God 
iiimself  in  what  the  Hebrews  had  revered  as  His  law.  It 
seemed  intended  to  launch  men  forth  into  unknown  spaces  of 
spiritual  experience,  with  none  of  the  helps,  guidances,  stimula- 
tions, which  had  been  familiar.  It  seemed,  almost,  to  sever  the 
world  from  Him  who  had  made  it ;  or  to  bar  before  men  the 
natural  way  of  access  to  Him.  "^ 

The  idea  of  sacrifice,  as  a  necessary  means  of  approaching 
with  acceptance  supernal  Powers,  seems  to  have  been  imbedded 
from  the  outset  in  the  timid  but  aspiring  human  heart.  Whether 
it  came  from  a  primitive  revelation,  and  had  drifted  down 
among  diverging  tribes,  to  take  Coleridge's  word  about  Plato^ 


106     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  31  AN 

as  '  a  plank  from  the  wreck  of  Paradise,'*  or  whetlier  it  was  a 
deep  native  impulse  of  the  soul  which  felt  itself  out  of  mora] 
sympathy  with  the  Powers  above — -this  has  been  a  question,  I 
need  not  remind  you,  keenly  discussed;  the  discussion  of  which 
is  not  at  all  ended.  But  whatever  the  answer  to  this  may  be, 
and  equally  whether  it  be  one  or  the  other,  the  fact  remains, 
that  sacrifices  were  offered  in  the  earliest  times  of  which  records 
remain,  and  were  only  offered  more  abundantly  among  the 
wealthier  and  haughtier  peoples.  They  were  regulated  by  God, 
according  to  the  Hebrew  understanding  of  things,  with  careful 
precision,  in  the  law  which  they  recognized  as  coming  from 
Him.  But  they  were  by  no  means  then  introduced :  for  the 
earliest  glimpse  we  have  of  Noah,  emerging  from  the  ark,  is 
when  he  builds  an  altar  to  Jehovah,  and  takes  of  QYQvy  clean 
beast  or  fowl  to  offer  his  sacrifice.f  Indeed,  the  first  glimpse 
we  have  of  men,  after  the  gates  of  Paradise  are  shut,  is  of  their 
differing  offerings  to  the  Lord.J  Suppose  these  legends,  myths, 
allegorical  pictures :  they  certainly  belong  to  a  time  very  early, 
and  they  show  the  impression  of  the  men  of  that  time  that 
sacrifice  to  the  unseen  Powers  had  been  known  on  the  earth  be- 
fore themselves,  before  all  other  authentic  history,  from  the  begin- 
ning. So  it  is  everywhere,  in  human  annals.  Nations  had  some- 
times democratic  beginnings,  the  pastoral  tribe  becoming 
organized  by  degrees  into  the  unity  and  strength  of  a  state; 
and  sometimes,,  at  the  outset  of  their  annals,  a  conquering  mon- 
arch marches  before  us,  with  his  aniiy  and  captains,  having 
already  his  capital  and  councillors.  But  always  at  the  outset  of 
history,  whatever  eise  is  there  or  is  not,  the  altar  is  there,  the 
ofiiciating  priest:  and  the  first  approach  which  man  makes  to 
the  gods  is  through  the  solemn  appeal  of  sacrifice. 

Buddhism  is  the  chief  form  of  religion,  which  has  prominently 
and  long  existed,  in  which  rites  of  sacrifice  have  not  been 
known.  This  comparatively  recent  reactionary  system  excluded 
such  offerings,  by  its  nature :  as  being  really  a  scheme  of  meta- 
physics, not  a  moral  or  spiritual  law ;  as  contemplating  deliver- 


*  Works  :  New  York  ed.,  1853:  Vol.  I.,  p.  134  (nt)te). 

t  Genes!  J  viii.  20.  X  Genesis  iv.  3,  4. 


TOWARD   QOB,  IN  WORSHIP.  107 

ance  from  the  miseries  of  life,  not  from  sin ;  as  knowing  no 
God,  and  placing  unconsciousness  at  the  summit  of  aspiration ; 
and  as  offering,  in  the  words  of  a  lucid  and  learned  expositor, 
'a  salvation  which  each  man  could  gain  for  himself,  and  by 
himself,  in  this  world,  during  this  life,  without  any  the  least 
reference  to  God,  or  to  gods,  either  great  or  small.'"*  Combine 
with  this  constitution  of  Buddhism  that  doctrine  of  the  sacred- 
Tiess  of  animal  life  according  to  which  the  worm  under  one's 
foot  might  become  in  the  end  a  supreme  Buddha,  and  the  result 
is  natural  that  it  should  stand  singularly  apart  from  other  reh'g- 
ions,  as  being  without  a  cultus  of  sacrifice. 

We  cannot  always  certainly  define  the  moral  significance  of 
the  different  forms  of  ethnic  offering,  since  our  knowledge  of 
them  is  not  complete.  But  in  the  Mosaic  system,  and  probably 
in  others,  they  had  in  part  an  expiatory  meaning,  as  offered  in 
atonement  for  acknowledged  transgression ;  some  had  a  dedi- 
catory intent ;  and  some,  the  more  affectionate  office  of  mani- 
festing gratitude  for  particular  gifts,  with  the  desire  to  enter 
into  personal  communion  with  him  from  whom  such  gifts  were 
conceived  to  have  come.  This  was  the  delightful  significance  of 
the  peace-offering  among  the  Hebrews.  It  is  at  least  not  im- 
probable that  the  altar  at  Athens  of  which  Paul  spoke,  *  To 
an  unknown  God,'  had  been  raised,  as  many  were,  in  such  an 
impulse  of  gratitude  to  an  undiscovered  benefactor,  esteemed 
Divine.  How  largely  the  strictly  expiatory  idea,  of  giving  pos- 
sessions or  the  fruit  of  the  body  for  the  sin  of  the  soul,  obtained 
among  peoples  outside  of  Palestine,  we  cannot  perhaps  be 
wholly  sure.  Probably  it  always  became  more  distinct  as  the 
personal  or  public  sense  of  transgression  became  more  acute  : 
after  some  extraordinary  and  frightful  offence,  or  when  national 
calamities  appeared  to  be  the  answering  punishment  for  public 
iniquities.  But  the  eucharistic  aspect  of  sacrifice,  which  makes 
it  a  thank-offering,  the  dedicatory,  and  that  which  presents  it  as 
a  form  of  supplication, — undoubtedly  these  prevailed  at  large,  as 
we  know  that  they  did  among  the  Hebrews ;  and  always  as  a 


♦  Rhys  Davids :   "  Indian  Buddhism  " :  New  York  ed.,  1883,  p.  29. 


108     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

thing  was  nobler  and  more  prized,  the  Divine  acceptance  of  it 
in  sacrifice  was  supposed  to  be  surer. 

So  costly  offerings,  of  gold  and  jewels,  became  familiar,  and 
the  treasuries  of  the  temples  were  splendidly  supplied  from  the 
riches  of  the  peoples.  So  animal  sacrifices  were  offered,  in 
China,  Persia,  India,  and  elsewhere.  So  human  sacrifices  came 
to  be  offered  among  many  peoples,  Phenician,  Arabian,  Roman, 
Greek,  our  Gothic  ancestors.  It  was  not  because  they  were  nat- 
urally insensible  to  the  softer  affections  ;  but  because  human  life, 
even  the  life  of  their  children,  appeared  likely  to  be  peculiarly  ac- 
ceptable to  such  gods  as  they  recognized.  Human  sacrifices 
were  thus  offered  at  Athens,  down  certainly  to  the  time  of  The- 
mistocles,  as  well  as  in  Thessaly,  Sparta,  Crete.  Though  they 
had  been  forbidden  at  Rome  by  decree  of  the  Senate,  less  than 
a  hundred  years  before  Christ,  they  continued  to  be  offered 
there — by  Csesar,  by  Augustus,  and  traces  of  them  had  not 
wholly  disappeared  in  the  time  of  Max  en  tins;  so  that  not  only 
Justin  Martyr  or  Tertullian  may  have  known  of  them  in  their 
day,  but  Lactantius  in  his.  Amid  the  splendid  commerce  of 
Carthage  children  were  offered,  whom  the  wealthy  and  childless 
sometimes  bought  of  the  poor,  and  whose  screams  were  drowned 
by  kettle-drums  as  they  were  immersed  in  the  blazing  gulf.  Not 
always,  at  least,  were  such  terrible  offerings  designed  for  expia- 
tion; as  in  the  instance  of  Marius,  cited  by  Plutarch — if  he  be 
conceded  to  be  the  author  of  the  Parallels — who  was  reported 
to  have  offered  his  daughter  to  the  gods  to  secure  a  victory 
which  he  thought  promised  in  a  dream  on  that  condition.  But, 
from  whatever  motive,  human  sacrifices  were  offered  widely  and 
late ;  and  no  chapters  of  history  are  more  frightful  than  those 
which  keep  these  records. 

Among  the  Hebrews  the  law  of  sacrifice  was,  as  we  know, 
systematically  arranged ;  and  all  its  details  took  significance  from 
the  spiritual  ends  which  it  was  obviously  designed  to  subserve. 
Men  were  taught,  of  course,  that  the  sacrifice  in  itself  was  noth- 
ing, to  Him  whose  is  the  earth  itself,  with  all  the  cattle  on  all 
the  hills ;  that  to  obey  was  better  than  to  sacrifice,  and  to  hearken 
better  than  fat  of  rams  ;*  that  God  desires  mercy,  and  the  knowl 


1  Samuel  xv.  22. 


TOWARD   GOD,  UST  WORSHIP.  100 

e<.tge  of  Himself,  more  than  burnt-offerings  ;*  and  that  by  doing 
justly,  loving  mercy,  and  walking  humbly  before  God,  one  real- 
ly comes  to  Him  with  acceptance.f  On  the  spiritual  apprehen- 
sion  of  the  import  of  sacrifice  prophets  and  psalmists  empliati- 
cally  insist ;  and  more  and  more  full  becomes  their  vivid  devel- 
opment of  this  as  their  ministry  touches  with  more  penetrating 
force  the  public  life.  But  still  the  law  of  sacrifice  abides :  care- 
ful, comprehensive,  hallowed  by  lofty  historical  memories,  con- 
secrated by  association  with  Him  from  whose  Divine  appoint- 
ment it  was  felt  to  have  come.  Ko  human  sacrifice  was  there 
allowed ;  no  such  revelry,  and  no  such  self-torture,  as  were  com- 
mon in  the  ethnic  rites.  It  was  in  part,  no  doubt,  to  guard  them 
against  these  that  the  Hebrews  were  shut  off  from  free  inter- 
course with  other  peoples  by  imperative  enactments,  as  by  the 
flaming  swords  of  cherubim.  But  life  was  offered  among  them : 
the  life  of  the  creature  carefully  selected,  without  blemish :  and 
the  blood  of  such  sacrifice  must  be  poured  out,  before  the  very 
High-Priest  himself  could  seek  remission  for  the  sin  of  the 
people.  Along  the  long  line  of  Hebrew  history  such  blood  had 
been  shed.  Continually  arose  above  Moriali,  down  to  the  end  of 
the  life  of  Jesus,  the  smoke  of  sacrifice,  ascending  to  Jehovah. 

It  was  therefore  an  almost  incalculable  change  introduced  to 
the  world  by  the  new  religion,  when,  without  a  lingering  trace 
of  such  external  sacrifice,  man  was  commanded  at  once,  eveiy- 
where,  to  draw  near  to  God.  Only  a  Pagan  emperor,  like  Julian, 
still  offered  such  sacrifice,  after  the  gospel  had  come  to  power. 
The  fact  of  the  change  cannot  be  denied,  however  men  may  differ 
in  explaining  its  conditions.  By  multitudes  of  disciples  it  has  been 
held,  in  subsequent  time,  that  the  previous  sacrifices  had  been 
typical  of  that  which  God  himself  was  at  last  to  offer,  in  the  in- 
carnation and  death  of  His  Son ;  and  that  this,  appropriated  by 
the  faith  of  the  believer,  presented  the  condition  on  which  the 
finite  and  penitent  soul  might  thereafter  approach  the  Most 
Holy.  Great  numbers  of  believers  affirm,  as  well,  that  this  sac- 
rifice is  effectually  repeated,  in  essential  substance,  when  the 
body  and  blood  of  Christ  are  presented,  beneath  the  figures  of 
bread  and  wine,  in  the  mass  which  is  central  in  Roman  Calho- 


*  Hosea  vi.  6.  t  Micah  vi.  8. 


110     THE  JSMW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

lie  worship.  This  is  to  them  a  eueharistie  and  an  impetrative 
saerifiee,  permanent  in  the  church,  continuing  and  consummat- 
ing what  was  anciently  prefigured.  Others  reject  both  these 
ideas,  and  hold  simply  that  sacrifice  was  abrogated,  when  Jesus 
unveiled  more  radiantly  to  men  the  majesty  and  the  mercy  of 
God,  and  showed  more  clearly  man's  nobleness  of  nature.  It  is 
not  now  important  to  inquire  whether  either  of  these,  whether 
any  other  explanation  of  the  change,  is  just  and  sufficient :  since 
the  only  point  now  before  us  is  the  ultimate  fact,  on  which  all 
must  agree,  that  the  old  forms  of  sacrifice,  known  from  the  b» 
ginning,  were  made  at  once  to  cease  by  Christianity,  wherever 
it  went;  and  that  the  most  radical  and  vast  revolution  evei 
known  on  the  earth  was  thus  wrought  by  it,  in  the  ritual  custom 
and  rule  of  mankind. 

It  was  not  a  philosophy,  you  observe,  which  accomplished 
this  change,  like  that  of  Gautama,  revolting  in  Buddhism 
against  the  oppressive  prevalent  religion,  and  substituting  for  it 
ethical  maxims,  with  a  general  speculative  scheme  of  the  uni- 
verse: recognizing  no  sin,  in  fact  no  soul,  and  therefore  of 
course  admitting  no  sacrifice.  It  was  here  a  religion,  which  only 
emphasized  the  fact  of  siu  beyond  any  other,  as  it  showed  the 
dignity  of  that  human  constitution  which  sin  pollutes,  and  the 
glory  of  Him  against  whom  it  is  committed ;  which  searched 
out  its  element  among  deepest  feelings  and  secret  thoughts,  and 
which  showed  God  as  consistently  severe  against  every  form  of 
tolerated  iniquity  as  Law  or  Prophet  had  ever  conceived  Him. 
At  the  same  time,  in  connection  with  these  illustrious  teachings, 
it  breaks  unexpectedly — this  surprising  religion — over  all  fixed 
and  ancient  landmarks  of  this  sovereign  rite.  Say,  if  you  please, 
that  it  acknowledged  on  Calvary — as  I,  for  one,  reverently  and 
gladly  believe  that  it  did — the  deep  preceding  instinct  of  sacrifice. 
At  any  rate  it  closed  the  history  :  and  wherever  it  went,  Koman 
and  Greek,  receiving  it,  were  strangers  thenceforth  to  ancestral 
altars.  The  hideous  rites  of  Syrian,  Phenician,  Gothic  sacri- 
fice, all  were  ended.  The  Druid  ceased  to  slay  his  victun  ;  and 
captive  or  child  was  no  more  liable  among  any  people  to  be 
offered  to  the  gods. 

It  descended  suddenly  on  the  custom  of  ages,  this  new  doctrine 


TOWARD   GOB,  IN  WORSHIP.  l\\ 

%nd  plan  of  worship.  It  had  no  affinities  with  philosophical 
doubt,  or  with  popular  apathy.  Least  of  all  had  it  anything  of 
that  prudential  political  spirit  which  made  Roman  religion  a  mode 
of  seeking  public  order,  and  which  led  Cicero  to  wish  that  all  its 
ceremonies  should  be  controlled  by  the  Senate.  Here  was  a  nv 
ligion,  full  of  force,  and  full  of  fire,  with  what  it  asserted  to  bo 
new  and  supreme  revelations  of  the  Infinite,  appearing  in  the 
world,  and  exciting  the  utmost  enthusiasm  of  men,  which  yet 
abruptly  swept  away  what  had  seemed  the  most  essential  of 
i-ites,  and  brought  men  instantly  face  to  face  with  the  God 
over  all !  It  came  like  a  day,  majestically  arising,  however  por- 
tended by  some  dispersed  and  struggling  beams.  It  came  amid 
a  people  to  whom  sacrifice  had  been  not  merely  an  instinct,  but, 
as  they  believed,  divinely  commanded,  with  the  ritual  for  it 
minutely  ordained.  It  came  in  an  hour  of  vast  general  moral 
gloom,  as  angel-voices  wei*e  declared  to  have  been  heard  in  mid- 
night skies.  It  came  in  connection  with  a  doctrine  of  human 
exposure  and  need  more  searching  and  profound  than  had  before 
been  preached  in  the  world.  It  came  at  once  for  all  mankind 
wherever  the  word  of  Jesus  went;  and  it  seems  nearly  impossi- 
ble to  feel  that  it  was  the  word  of  any  mere  man,  with  no  pe- 
culiar Divine  authority  upon  and  behind  him,  which  either  dared 
to  attempt  or  was  able  to  accomplish  a  change  so  prodigious  and 
unexpected,  and  as  vividly  complete  in  its  startling  consumma- 
tion as  any  contrived  tragic  catastrophe. 

But  this  termination  of  the  earlier  physical  rite  of  sacrifice 
did  not  stand  by  itself,  an  isolated  and  a  negative  thing,  in  the 
scheme  of  worship  thus  offered  to  mankind.  It  was  vitally  con- 
nected with  conditioning  principles,  of  the  fruit  of  which 
we  constantly  partake,  but  which  we  do  not  always  refer  as  we 
shonld  to  the  august  initiative  of  Jesus.  It  is  hard  for  us  tc 
feel  how  much  Christianity  has  done  for  the  world  in  this  regard, 
&s  it  is  hard  to  replace  before  our  thoughts  the  woods  and 
swamps  which  three  centuries  ago  covered  the  sites  of  American 
cities,  or  to  feel  the  relative  nearness  of  the  time  when  no  land- 
scape glowed  to  our  ancestors  on  any  canvas,  and  when  no  mu- 
sic, such  as  delights  us,  had  ever  sounded  in  the  chill  and  still 
American  air.     The  more  distinctly  our  thought  goes  back  to 


112      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

the  time  when  the  new  religion  was  announced,  tlie  more  shall 
we  feel  how  novel  not  only,  how  grand,  uplifting,  impenetrating 
in  power,  was  the  scheme  of  worship  thus  conveyed  to  the  world : 
what  a  debt  the  race  owes  to  the  teachings  of  Christianity,  if 
only  for  the  work  thereby  accomplished. 

/  Sacrifice  is  still  required  of  men,  by  the  law  of , the  Master, 
but  it  is  now  the  sacrifice  of  confession,  of  repentance  and 
restitution,  where  another  has  been  injured ;  the  sacrifice  of 
whatever  is  lower  in  our  nature  to  whatever  is  higher,  of  what- 
ever is  pleasing  in  our  custom  of  life  to  the  glory  of  God,  in  the 
welfare  of  others,  or  in  our  own  noblest  advancement ;  the  sacri- 
fice, always,  of  ease,  and  inclination  to  the  imperative  claims  of 
duty;  the  sacrifice  of  a  supreme  dedication  of  soul  and  life  to 
Him  from  whom  our  life  has  come,  and  by  whom  the  soul,  in  its 
marvellous  powers,  has  been  ordained.  It  is  rooted,  fundamen- 
tally, this  Christian  sacrifice,  in  the  idea  of  sin,  as  a  force  which 
separates  man  from  God ;  in  the  idea  of  God,  who  requires  self- 

^  surrender  on  the  part  of  his  worshippers.  It  is  not,  therefore, 
a  sacrifice  to  be  accomplished  by  the  hands,  accomplished  by 
another,  in  grove,  or  glen,  or  solemn  temple.  It  is  to  be  accom- 
plished within  the  heart,  by  each  for  himself ;  and  the  things 
devoted,  the  things  destroyed,  are  the  very  things  most  natively 
precious:  our  passions,  appetites,  and  eager  desires;  the  pride 
which  forbids  us  to  acknowledge  wrong-doing;  the  love  of  en- 
joyment, which  prompts  us  to  use  the  world  for  our  luxury ;  the 
desire  for  eminent  position  and  power,  which  seems  as  native  to 
aspiring  spirits  as  the  function  of  breathing  to  the  lungs. 

In  comparison  with  these  sacrifices,  moral,  invisible,  which 
have  been  made  by  millions  uncounted  since  Jesus  showed  the 
Invisible  Father  to  the  homage  of  mankind,  the  offering  of  heca- 
tombs of  oxen  and  sheej) — of  the  scores  of  thousands  of  animals 
slain  in  China,  for  example,  at  the  vernal  and  autumnal  festivals 
of  Confucius — were  a  trifling  thing.  That  might  involve  a 
small  loss  of  possessions ;  but  this  implies  the  destruction  of  the 
])assion  which  insists  on  possession.  That  might  simply  inten- 
sify pride,  where  this  overwhelms  it ;  and  all  sensual  desire,  all 
purely  secular  and  selfish  ambition,  might  perfectly  consist  with 
external  offerings  most  numerous  and  costly,  even  under  the 


TOWARD   GOD,  US'  WORSHIP.  US'. 

solemn  Hebrew  ritual.  But  that  which  tlie  Lord  asks,  as  the 
primal  element  in  the  worship  of  God,  is  a  complete  self-devo- 
tion  to  Him ;  the  offerer  and  the  victim  being  the  same,  the 
scene  of  the  transcendent  offering  being  the  soul:  as  Tertullian 
said,  when  pleading  for  the  freedom  of  worship  in  the  empire, 
"Let  one  man  worship  God,  another  Jupiter;  let  one  raise 
suppliant  hands  to  the  heaven,  another  to  the  altar  of  Fides. 
....  Let  one  consecrate  his  own  life  to  his  God,  and  another 
that  of  a  goat."*  As  an  earlier  and  a  greater  than  Tertullian 
Iiad  said:  "Ye  also,  as  living  stones,  are  built  up  a  spiritual 
house,  to  be  a  holy  priesthood,  to  offer  up  spiritual  sacrifices, 
acceptable  to  God,  through  Jesus  Christ."f  The  sacerdotal 
office  is  involved  in  every  sacrificial  scheme;  and  the  universal 
priesthood  of  believers  rests  upon  the  fact  that  each  for  himself, 
under  the  B'aith  which  came  by  Jesus,  is  to  offer  himself,  a  true 
and  living  oblation  to  God. 

That  this  is  not  a  mere  speculative  idea,  an  ethical  formula, 
or  a  high  but  abstract  spiritual  conception — that  it  is  a  bind- 
ing practical  rule,  introduced  by  Christianit}^ — is  as  evident  in 
history  as  the  empire  of  Rome.  Whoever  conceives  of  Chris-  ^ 
tian  service  as  consisting  chiefly  in  hearing  sermons,  enjoying 
the  pleasant  society  of  good  people,  cultivating  taste  and  a  kindly 
temper,  passing  temperately  through  a  prosperous  life,  and  giv- 
ing occasionally,  of  an  over-abundance,  for  relief  of  the  needy, 
has  certainly  missed  the. grandest  idea  of  his  religion  concerning 
true  worship.  He  has  fallen  from  sympathy  with  the  great' 
High-Priest  of  his  own  faith.  He  has  fallen  from  sympathy 
with  those  who,  in  any  time  or  place,  have  nobly  in  heart  ful- 
filled the  Lord's  plan,  and  offered  to  God,  after  whatever  sharp 
wrench  of  the  spirit,  what  to  them  was  most  precious.  The 
fierce  Dominic,  offeiing  himself  to  be  sold  as  a  slave  that  the 
poor  woman's  brother  might  be  redeemed ;  Francis  of  Assisi, 
madman  if  you  choose,  but  with  a  tender  love  for  bird  and 
beast,  and  a  wholly  unconquerable  courage  before  men,  fasting,^ 
praying,  preaching,  building,  as  if  the  soul  would  absolutely  slay 
the  body,  and  offer  it  to  God — these  men  rebuke  us,  if  we  have 


♦Apologet.,  c.  24.  1 1  Peter  ii.  5. 

8 


114     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

found  the  lazy  luxury  of  Sunday-services  synonymous  to  us  with 
Christian  worship.  Confession,  w^iich  ultimates  in  self-sacrifice, 
is  its  law;  not  self-satisfaction,  wliich  precedes  self-indulgence. 
And,  blessed  be  God !  such  has  been  often  sublimely  shown, 
from  the  earliest  time. 

The  martyr  burning  at  the  stake  may  have  furnished  no 
proof  in  that  supreme  action  of  any  divinity  in  the  religion 
which  he  confessed ;  for  men  have  died,  and  women  too,  on  be- 
half of  convictions  real  to  them,  and  of  transcendent  worth, 
which  we  relegate  without  question  to  chaotic  realms  of  fancy 
or  fable.  But  the  Christian  martyr,  dying  for  his  Faith,  did  at 
least  illustrate  in  his  person  the  law  of  self-sacrifice  which  the 
Master  had  taught,  and  become  a  true  king  and  priest  unto  God. 
The  missionary  teacher  has  done  the  same,  in  Catholic  and  in 
Protestant  communions, — amid  savage  ferocities  of  American 
Indians,  amid  cruelties  and  cannibalisms  of  remote  islands. 
Fathers  and  mothers,  giving  up  their  beloved  to  what  they 
thought  the  service  of  God,  have  done  the  same :  and  multi- 
tudes of  saintly  women,  or  of  devout  and,  heroical  men,  have 
shown  in  life,  and  illustrated  in  death,  that  perfect  law  of  per- 
sonal sacrifice  which  they  had  learned  from  the  Master  of  Chris- 
tendom. It  has  been  the  law  of  Christian  worship,  as  sharp 
and  imperative  as  any  rule  of  ethnic  or  of  Hebrew  worship, 
that  only  by  the  oblations  of  God — body  and  spirit  presented  to 
Him  in  living  ofifering — can  men  with  acceptance  approach  His 
throne. 

But  this,  we  must  observe,  is  not  at  all,  in  the  Christian  con- 
templation, a  service  of  fear,  to  be  wrested  from  the  worshipper 

/  by  the  dread  of  Divine  neglect  or  vengeance.  The  sacrifice  of 
fielf  to  the  service  of  God,  which  is  the  first  element  in  the 
new  worship,  is  to  be  a  free  and  voluntary  offering,  spontane- 
ously brought  in  the  impulse  of  love,  and  through  the  attrac- 
tion of  that  glory  of  God  which  resides  in  his  grace.  The  work, 
for  its  own  sake,  is  relatively  nothing.  The  adoring,  self-forget- 
ful, fervent  spirit,  jubilant  wath  Divine  affection,  that  is  supreme. 
By  this,  each  endurance  and  endeavor  must  be  glorified.  Only 
as  so  inspired  and  crowned  does  anything  in  worship  becomo 

N  lovely  or  grand. 


TOWARD   GOD,  Ilf^  WORSHIP.  115 

This  is  too  plainly  the  doctrine  of  Christianity  to  need  illus. 
fcration.  How  distinctively  it  belongs  to  this  system  of  religion, 
discriminating  it  from  any  other,  I  need  scarcely  remind  you. 
The  master-word  of  this  religion  always  is  Love:  toward  God,/** 
toward  Man.  It  so  presents  God  as  to  win  for  him  love,  if  that  J 
be  possible,  from  the  most  selfish  or  sceptical  spirit.  It  honors 
and  eulogizes  the  nature  of  Man,  by  demanding  this  from  hirn. 
It  founds  its  unsparing  censure  of  his  character  on  the  fact  that  he 
does  not  cherish  or  express  this,  notwithstanding  such  regal 
powers  are  his.  In  the  fact  that  he  can  serve  God  in  love,  is 
the  reason  why  such  a  religion  was  sent.  In  the  fact  that  he 
does,  sometimes  at  least,  reach  this  attainment,  is  the  alleged 
fruit  of  the  Master's  mission,  and  the  pledge  in  the  soul  of  the 
Life  everlasting.  With  the  vital  and  exuberant  energy  of  love 
prompting  and  shaping  it,  everything  done  by  man  toward  God 
takes  celestial  value.  The  fragrance  of  the  ointment  poured 
out  in  worship,  by  the  humblest  offering  lovingly  given  to  Him 
who  equally  shapes  the  planet  and  rounds  the  tear,  who  sets 
suns  in  their  places  and  paints  with  gold  the  insect's  breast — the 
perfume  of  that  adoring  service  fills  the  heavens ! 

It  was  from  this  new  element  of  love,  pouring  into  worship 
toward  Him  whom  Christianity  supremely  declared,  that  that 
worship  took  its  prevalent  tone  of  joy  and  triumph,  as  soon  a& 
it  emerged  from  cavern  and  catacomb,  and  began  to  exercise  its 
liberty  in  the  world.  Its  whole  temper  had  been  expressed  in 
the  Epistle  of  Barnabas,  written  probably  early  in  the  second 
century :  '  Wherefore,  also,  we  keep  the  eighth  day  with  joy- 
fulness,  the  day  on  which  Jesus  rose  again  from  the  dead ;  and 
when  he  had  manifested  Himself,  he  ascended  into  the  Heav- 
ens.'* New^  forms  of  expression  were  needed  for  the  new  and 
surpassing  joy ;  and  they  came,  inevitably,  in  a  wondrous  and 
victorious  '  tone-speech.' 

The  careful  student  of  the  history  of  Music  finds  nothing 
more  remarkable  in  it  than  the  elastic  development  of  the  art, 
adv^ancing  by  bounds  rather  than  by  gradual  imperceptible 
progress,  when  the  doctrine  of  the  ]^ew  Testament  had  come  ta 

*  Chap.  XV. 


116      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  JUAN 

its  quickening  dominance  among  men.  The  Greeks  were  nnt- 
urally  a  musical  people,  and  the  finer  mathematical  relations  of 
Bounds  had  been  studied  among  them,  certainly  from  (he  time 
of  Pythagoras ;  but  the  laws  of  symphonetic  harmony,  as  rep- 
resenting coincidences  of  according  sounds  simultaneously  pro- 
duced, are  thought  by  many  to  have  been  by  them  wholly  un- 
recognized:  their  music  contemplating  melody  only,  or  the 
arrangement  in  succession  of  different  sounds  for  a  voice  or  in- 
strument. Even  then,  their  music  was  principally,  it  would  ap- 
pear, in  the  minor  mode.  Only  a  kind  of  recitative,  among  the 
Romans,  accompanied  their  famous  odes.  The  very  instruments 
of  music  known  to  these  graceful  or  powerful  peoples  were 
comparatively  few ;  and  however  immensely  they  surpassed  the 
Hebrews  in  literary  accomplishments,  in  political  skill  or  mili- 
tary strength,  as  well  as  in  painting  or  plastic  art,  they  seem 
scarcely  to  have  equalled  them  in  the  variety  and  range  of  their 
musical  resources.  The  inspiration  of  a  worship  nobler  and 
more  animating  among  the  Hebrews,  had  given  them  psaltery, 
harp,  flute,  cymbal,  timbrel,  trumpet,  and  shawm  ;  it  had  gathered 
singing  men  and  women  around  the  court,  when  that  was  estab- 
lished; and  it  preserved,  to  the  end  of  their  separate  public 
history,  schools  of  musicians,  with  multitudes  of  ministers  for 
the  service  of  song.  They  accepted  much,  no  doubt,  from  the 
Egyptians,  as  the  Greeks  did  also,  who  afterward  borrowed 
largely  as  well  from  Phrygia  and  from  Lydia.  But  the  He- 
brews accepted  and  absorbed  what  hardly  seemed  cognate  with 
their  natural  genius,  because  they  had  an  inspiring  use  for  it, 
and  felt  their  need  of  it  imperative.  The  very  name  of  their 
Psalms,  or  Praise-hymns,  implies  in  itself  instrumental  accom- 
paniments; and  though  they  wanted  the  fertile  fancy,  the  hvely 
sensibility,  the  facility  of  invention,  in  which  the  Attic  genius 
was  eminent,  music  at  least  was  always  more  to  them  than 
*  the  signet  of  an  emerald,  set  in  a  work  of  gold,'  which  the 
proverb  had  declared  it  to  be  when  associated  with  wine  in  secu- 
lar feasts.*  It  was  a  voice  of  exulting  thanksgiving  to  the 
Holiest  in  the  Heavens ;  a  royal  instrument  for  adoration  in 
worship. 

*  Ecclesiasticus  xxxii.  6. 


TOWABD   GOB,  IN  WORSHIP.  H^ 

But  when  Christianity  had  broken  forth  upon  the  world,  with 
its  loftier  discoveries  both  of  God  and  of  man,  and  of  the  dutv 
of  man  to  his  Author,  the  spirit  taught  by  it  could  not  remain  sat. 
isfied  with  previous  modes  of  tuneful  utterance.  It  had  to  find 
a  yet  richer  voice  for  richer  feeling,  and  to  make  invention  con- 
tribute to  its  needs.  So  came,  very  early,  antiphonal  chants  in 
unison,  with  appropriate  music  for  the  Trisagion,  or  seraphical 
hymn.  So  the  laws  of  harmony,  with  the  connected  counter- 
point, appeared.  So  instruments  were  added,  which  the  earlier 
church  perhaps  had  declined,  till  the  organ  found  its  complete- 
ness and  its  home.  And  so  music  became  ever  richer  and 
grander,  in  anthem,  mass,  and  mighty  oratorio,  in  the  passionate 
wail  of  the  Miserere,  the  exultant  chords  of  the  Jubilate,  in  the 
Gloria  in  Excelsis,  the  Benedicite,  the  Magnificat,  and  the  Te 
Deum.  Back  to  Gregory,  St.  Augustine,  Ambrose,  Chrysostom, 
Basil,  we  trace  the  vast  history :  and  they  but  represented  a 
tendency,  energetic  and  controlling,  of  which  they  were  the  ex- 
ponents, not  the  creators.  The  pleasure  connected  with  the  va- 
rious ceremonies  of  the  ethnic  religions  had  been  that  of  household 
or  social  festivity,  of  public  games  and  picturesque  pageants. 
But  the  rich  and  lofty  spiritual  joy  in  the  worship  of  God,  as 
that  worship  was  at  once  inspired  and  instructed  by  the  genius 
of  Christianity,  this  it  was  which  lifted  from  the  first  the  voice 
of  the  Church  in  her  unending  grateful  song. 

Canonical  singers  were  early  ordained,  with  the  admonition, 
"  See  that  thou  believe  in  thy  heart  what  thou  singest  with  thy 
mouth,  and  approve  in  thy  works  what  thou  believest  in  thy 
heart."  Of  such  music  it  was  that  Augustine  wrote,  in  words 
palpitating  with  feeling,  and  shining  still  as  with  the  glister  of 
joyful  tears.  But  to  no  separated  officers  was  the  great  function  in 
the  churches  confined.  "All  come  together  with  us  to  sing,"  said 
Chrysostom,  "  and  in  it  they  unitedly  join ;  the  young  and  the 
old,  the  rich  and  the  poor,  women  and  men,  slaves  and  the  free, 
all  send  forth  one  melody.  The  prophet  speaks,  and  we  all  re- 
spond, all  sing  together.  Secular  iiiequalities  are  here  expelled. 
One  chorus  is  formed  of  the  whole  congregation ;  there  is  a 
grand  harmony  of  voices,  and  the  earth  imitates  Heaven."  *    '  Tho 

*  Opera  :  Venice,  1741 :  Vol.  XH.,  p.  349. 


118     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

ploughman  at  his  plough,'  said  Jerome,  in  a  passage  often  quo- 
ted, '  sings  his  joyful  hallelujahs :  the  busy  mower  refreshes 
himself  with  psalms :  the  vine-dresser  sings  the  songs  of  David.'' 
In  social  and  domestic  life  the  same  new  sounds  of  melody  were 
heard.  Inartistic  no  doubt,  to  us  discordant,  were  these  primi- 
tive Christian  airs.  But  they  were  a  voice  of  wholly  strange 
sweetness  amid  the  clashing  and  fierce  confusions  which  for  agca 
had  filled  the  world.  They  gave  immediate  response,  from  exult- 
ing souls,  to  the  new  and  astonishing  religion  which  was  here 
The  music  was  a  mirror,  as  has  well  been  said,  '  placed  at  such 
an  angle  that  in  it  was  reflected  the  very  blue  of  Heaven  itself.' 
So  it  was  sung  in  the  dungeon  of  the  prisoner,  at  the  stake  of 
the  martyr,  in  the  palace  of  later  emperors,  as  well  as  in  Chris- 
tian house  and  field ;  and  so  it  has  never  ceased  to  be  heard 
wherever  the  new  religion  has  gone.  Philosophy  does  not  singr 
Unbelief  does  not  sing.  A  scientific  positivism  has  no  conceiv- 
able utterance  of  music.  The  tender  and  infinite  aspiration  of 
that  incessantly  contradicts  it.  It  is  only  the  faith  which  ac- 
cepts with  love  the  Lord  who  comes  to  us  in  Christianity,  and 
which  through  him  sees  an  Infinite  Mind  illuminating  alike  the 
heavens  and  the  earth,  which  exults  in  the  mystic  ministry  of 
music,  as  it  carols  like  a  bird  in  aspiring  song,  or  rolls  the  vast 
harmonies  of  its  new  adoration  from  choir  to  chorus,  and  from 
organ  to  organ. 

But  even  the  music  does  not  fully  illustrate  the  new  motive 
which  had  come  into  worship,  the  grander  impulse  and  law 
which  controlled  it.  We  must  associate  with  it  the  new  Hjanno- 
dy  which  also  started  into  utterance  with  the  advent  of  Chris- 
tianity. The  ancient  psalms  were  again  sung — usually  proba- 
bly in  the  Septuagint,  or  later  in  the.  Italic  or  the  Syriac  Version 
— by  Christian  assemblies,  even  when  these  were  met  with  the 
silent  dead,  in  the  darkness  of  catacombs ;  and  doubtless  a  deeper 
sense  was  felt  than  ever  before  of  their  prophetic  value  and  im- 
port, as  they  seemed  to  the  disciples  to  have  pointed  forward  to 
the  Son  of  God,  prefiguring  even  his  passion  and  cross,  and  aa 
he  had  sung  from  them,  with  his  beloved,  on  the  same  night  on 
which  he  was  betrayed.  But  even  at  the  outset  were  also 
hymns  and  spiritual  songs,  not  included  among  the  psalms,  yet 


TOWARD   QOD,   IN    WORSHIP.  119 

familiar  to  tlie  clmrohes,  upon  wliicli  apostles  pronounced  their 
blessing:  from  which  Paul,  at  least,  seems  distinctly  to  have 
quoted.  The  Evening-hymn,  transmitted  by  the  revered  Basil 
from  the  fourth  century,  and  declared  by  him  to  be  then  very 
ancient,  may  have  been  one  of  them.  The  Gloria  in  Excelsis, 
the  Angelical  Hymn,  is  ascribed  in  its  concluding  part  to  the 
middle  of  the  second  century ;  and  it  has  been  conceived  by 
some,  with  no  essential  improbability,  to  be  the  hymn  which  as 
Pliny  wrote  the  Christians  sang  alternately  to  Christ.  An  ex- 
tant hymn  of  Clement  of  Alexandria  is  little  later  in  its  origin. 

How  rapidly,  and  how  widely,  this  new  impulse  wrought  to 
the  expression  of  the  new  faith  and  loftier  love  inspired  toward 
God,  you  know  already :  how  Gregory  E"azianzen,  John  of  Da- 
mascus, Sophronius,  and  others,  put  Christian  history  into  Greek 
odes ;  how  the  Latin  language,  in  the  Western  Church,  developed 
even  unsuspected  capacities  under  this  inspiration  :  accent  taking 
the  place  of  quantity  in  the  cantilation,  and  the  rhyme,  of  which 
few  examples  are  found  in  classical  poetry,  becoming  a  familiar 
mark  of  the  hymns.  Hilary  of  Poictiers,  Ambrose,  Prudentius, 
Fortunatus,  Gregory  the  Great,  Peter  Damiani,  Thomas  Aquinas, 
Adam  of  St.  Yictoire,  James  de  Benedictis,  the  Bernards, 
Thomas  of  Celano — you  know  the  long  illustrious  roll  of  those 
who  thus  uttered  in  various  strains  the  thought  of  the  church, 
through  centuries  otherwise  filled  with  gloom ;  who  in  cloister 
or  court,  chapel  or  camp,  made  the  harshest  skies  responsive 
and  resonant  with  their  tribute  to  God. 

And  with  such  hymns  came  as  well  the  great  Creeds : — hymns 
themselves,  '  to  be  said  or  sung,'  some  rubrics  say,  but  better  *  to 
be  sung,'  if  only  this  be  done  by  the  whole  congregation,  with 
sufficient  instrumental  and  vocal  assistance  to  invigorate  and 
sustain.  This  is  the  earliest  function  of  the  Creeds.  They  are 
not  what  in  modern  times  are  called  specifically  *  Confessions 
of  Faith,'  though  in  the  large  sense  they  surely  are  such,  and  of 
noblest  significance.  But  they  are  not  careful  philosophical 
definitions  of  particulars  of  doctrine,  precisely  outlined,  system- 
.atically  arranged.  In  the  Creeds — the  'Apostolic'  from  the 
Western  Church,  or  the  'ISTicene'  from  the  Eastern — the  great 
facts  of  his  religion,  as  he  understood  them,  were  expressed  bj 


J 20      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

the  Christian,  to  be  triumpliantlj  uttered  in  worship.  They 
were  born  of  experience,  augmented  by  its  growth,  with  ita 
tremendous  diapasons  rolling  through  them :  a  nobler  origin  than 
if  either  or  both  had  come  from  the  pens  of  dictating  apostles. 
And  surely  there  are  no  other  compositions,  of  human  minds, 
superior  to  these  in  essential  and  mighty  melody,  in  spiritual 
power,  or  in  the  memories  which  cling  to  their  crowded  lines. 
One  scarcely  can  read  the  *  Apostles'  Creed' — which  the  West- 
minster divines  added  to  their  catechism,  which  they  who  pre- 
pared, or  w^ho  afterward  adopted,  the  Heidelberg  catechism 
gladly  received,  which  is  in  the  fullest  sense  ecumenical  and 
perennial — without  feeling  afresh  the  wonder  of  that  mystei-ious 
energy  which  built  it  to  its  compact  completeness  through  stormy 
ages :  starting  with  the  great  confession  of  Peter,  finding  a  sov- 
ereign shaping  law  in  the  baptismal  formula,  leaving  traces  of 
its  working  in  Ignatius,  Justin,  Irengeus,  more  largely  in  Tertul- 
lian,  not  articulating  the  creed  to  the  world  till  perhaps  the 
fourth  century,  not  rounding  it  till  still  later  into  the  ampler 
and  final  form  which  now  is  familiar;  but  all  the  time,  from 
first  to  last,  holding  unabated  the  primitive  faith  in  the  Divine 
facts,  and  making  those  facts  the  song  and  the  strength  of  those 
who  received  them.  Certainly,  one  cannot  thoughtfully  read  it 
without  being  carried  on  its  majestic  affirmative  words  to  the 
day  when  the  fire  flamed  for  the  Christian,  unless  he  would  cast 
a  pinch  of  incense  on  the  altar  of  the  emperor,  and  when  the 
answer  came  ringing  back  from  man  or  maid,  before  prefect 
and  people,  ^*I  believe  in  God  the  Father  Almighty,  and  in 
Jesus  Christ,  His  only  Son,  our  Lord ! "  It  was,  in  very  deed, 
age  after  age,  the  hymn  of  the  martyrs. 

So  one  scarcely  can  read  the  *  Nicene  Creed '  without  recall- 
ing that  venerable  council  where,  as  Stanley  reminds  us,  'the 
battle  was  fought  and  won  by  quotations,  not  from  tradition, 
but  from  the  Scriptures';*  where  the  Holy  Gospels  were  on  a 
throne  in  the  centre,  as  the  nearest  approach  to  Christ  himself ; 
and  where  the  men  whose  sinews  had  been  cut,  whose  bodies 
bad  been  branded  and  curiously  tortured,  whose  right  eyes  had 


♦  "Eastern  Church":  N.  Y.  ed.,  1863;  p.  208. 


TOWARD    GOB,   IN  WORSHIP.  121 

been  dug  out  with  swords,  and  their  sockets  seared  with  heated 
iron,  met  with  scholars  and  teachers,  bishops  and  the  emperorj  to 
testify  of  their  Faith.  The  exulting  Christian  conscioucness  in 
the  world,  that  it  was  which  gave  birth  to  the  symbol,  majestic 
and  tender.  It  was  expanded  later,  at  Constantinople  and  at  Chal- 
cedon ;  but  only  to  make  it  more  fully  representative  of  this 
advancing  Christian  consciousness.  And  they  who  imagine  the 
early  creeds  to  have  been  a  burden  on  the  faith  which  they 
expressed,  have  altogether  misconceived  them.  They  were 
standards  and  symbols :  as  the  Church  militant,  like  the  army, 
needs  such  to  inspire  and  rally  its  squadrons.  But  they  were, 
above  all,  the  grand  cadenced  and  triumphing  hymns  of  the 
Chnrch ;  the  solemn  and  victorious  carols  into  which  its  voice 
spontaneously  arose  as  it  took  up  its  morning-march  in  the 
world.  If  they  seem  anything  less  to  us,  it  is  because  the  spirit 
of  faith,  which  inspired  such  worship,  has  lost  a  part  of  its  en- 
ergy in  our  souls. 

So,  also,  with  hymns  and  cantilated  creeds,  came  in  gradual 
but  rapid  development,  after  the  apostolic  times,  the  great  com- 
mon Liturgies,  to  give  equally  their  choral  and  sovereign  voice  to 
the  spirit  of  praise  in  the  Christian  assemblies.  Their  germ  is 
in  the  central  and  solemn  eucharistic  service,  and  there  are  many 
analogies  between  them;  but  each  principal  Church  has  its 
liberty  in  regard  to  them,  and  they  grow  variously,  at  Antioch, 
Alexandria,  Cesarea,  Edessa,  or  Byzantium,  as  at  Rome  or  at 
Milan.  The  Gallic  takes  one  form,  and  the  Spanish  another, 
by  some  esteemed  the  most  joyful  of  all ;  while  the  various 
*  uses,'  as  they  are  called,  of  Hereford,  York,  Lincoln,  and  other 
dioceses,  are  familiar  to  the  Saxons,  until  the  overshadowing 
Roman  authority  compels  uniformity.  Luther  must  still  take 
something  from  them,  amid  the  tumultuous  outbreak  of  Refor- 
mation :  so  must  Zinzendorf,  the  Huguenots,  the  reformers  oi 
Holland,  and  those  of  Sweden :  in  larger  measure  the  reformers 
of  England.  It  may  not  be  necessary  for  us  verbally  to  repeat 
them.  We  might,  possibly,  count  it  a  hindrance  and  a  grief  to 
have  our  amplest  liberty  of  worship  constrained  or  limited  by 
the  mandatory  requirement  to  use  any  one  of  these  historical 
helps  to  devotion.     But  when  one  studies  them,  in  their  im 


122      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

mense  and  vital  substance — the  liturgy  of  James,  so  called,  or 
of  Mark,  or  of  John  at  Ephesus,  from  which  the  Gallicani 
claimed  specially  to  be  derived — it  is  impossible  not  to  see  what 
joy  and  vigor,  what  a  tone  of  exulting  faith  and  love,  had  burst 
upon  the  world  when  Jesus  brought  the  new  tidings  of  God. 
With  the  swing  and  stride  of  a  giant's  strength  the  Church 
went  forth  to  that  long  battle  which  never  has  ceased ;  but  it 
went,  as  well,  with  the  voice  as  of  '  hai-pers,  harping  with  theiF 
harps.' 

But  the  worship  thus  introduced  bj  Christianity — a  worship 
without  external  sacrifice,  but  with  the  inward  devotion  of  self,. 
which  springs  from  love,  and  which  utters  itself  in  tones  of 
mighty  and  affectionate  triumph — is  not  a  service,  this  also  must 
be  noted,  to  be  transacted  on  certain  days,  or  only  in  particular 
places.  It  is  at  home  everywhere ;  and  wheresoever  the  wor- 
shipper is,  in  whatever  hour  of  darkness  or  of  day,  there  is  it 
equally  timely  and  meet.  Not  on  the  Lord's  Day  only  is  it  fit- 
ting, but  at  every  time  when  need  is  felt  and  moral  impulse ; 
and  the  services  of  solemn  festival  or  fast  are  only  to  contribute 
to  its  earnestness  at  each  moment.  The  Books  of  Hours  illus- 
trate this,  of  which  many  survive  from  the  Middle  Age.  It  is  an; 
axiom  with  us,  who  perhaps  use  no  such  books.  It  was  a  not 
unnatural  impulse  of  piety,  starting  witli  the  annual  observance 
of  the  day  of  the  Lord's  death,  of  His  resurrection,  and  of  the 
coming  of  the  Holy  Ghost  at  Pentecost,  and  proceeding  later  to- 
the  celebration  of  the  supposed  day  of  His  nativity,  and  of  His 
baptism,  at  length  to  endeavor  to  make  the  whole  year  not  secu- 
lar only,  but  also  Christian  ;  overlaying  its  brass  with  heavenly 
gold ;  associating  the  seasons  with  different  parts  of  the  Chris- 
tian record,  and  making  the  sun  on  his  path  through  the  heav- 
ens recall  the  successive  discoveries  of  God  in  the  stupendous 
story  of  the  Gospels.  This,  no  doubt,  may  become  with  time  a 
mere  matter  of  form  ;  but  the  instinct  beneath  it  is  lovely  and 
grand,  since  its  purpose  was  to  show  the  whole  succession  of 
months  sacred  to  God,  and  every  season,  every  time,  a  time 
meet  for  celestial  communing. 

Such  universality  of  Christian  worship,  in  respect  of  time,  and 
also  of  place,  belongs  to  its  nature  ;  but  it  is  as  special  a  prerog, 


TOWARD    GOD,  /iV^   WORSHIP.  123 

ative  of  it  as  flight  is  of  birds.  The  ethnic  religions,  recogniz- 
ing many  local  gods,  tended  of  course  to  localize  constantly  the 
homage  to  be  paid  to  them  ;  as  the  temple  of  Serapis  was  de- 
stroyed at  Eome  by  the  very  Augustus  who  had  spared  Alexan- 
dria on  account  of  its  presence  ;  as  the  coming  of  new  gods  into 
a  city  was  understood  to  disturb  and  displease  the  older.  The 
gods  had  their  houses,  as  kings  had  theirs.  The  renowned  tem- 
ple of  Diana  at  Ephesus,  in  which  was  enthroned  the  many- 
breasted  wooden  image  declared  to  have  been  dropped  from  the 
heavens  to  the  earth, — the  temples  of  Apollo,  at  Delphi  or  Ar- 
gos,  or  on  tlie  Palatine  hill  at  Rome — the  Parthenon,  in  honor  of 
the  Virgin  Athene  at  Athens,  w^ith  the  temples  to  Jupiter,  Saturn, 
JEsculapius,  and  the  others,  which  crowned  the  Capitol-hill  at 
Rome,  or  embellished  the  Forum,  or  gave  consecration  to  the 
island  in  the  Tiber — these,  and  the  others  famous  in  the  world, 
onlv  represe7:ted  a  rule  of  thought  native  to  the  mind,  and 
hardly  to  be  expelled  from  it,  which  assigned  to  the  gods  pecul- 
iar habitations,  as  conceiving  them  stronger  and  swifter  than 
men  but  invested  similarly  with  Unite  conditions.  On  the 
mountain-top,  in  recesses  of  the  forests,  in  the  cavern  from  which 
shrieked  inarticulate  winds,  as  well  as  in  shining  stellar  places, 
they  might  dwell  apart ;  but  in  the  shrines  of  man's  erection 
they  also  tarried,  and  might  be  approached  with  acceptable 
praise.  And  as  the  worship  rendered  there  was  older,  richer,  more 
sumptuous  in  display,  more  abundant  in  offerings,  their  accept- 
ance of  it  was  supposed  to  be  surer. 

This  is  not  remarkable.  It  was  to  be  expected.  But  it  is  re- 
markable, at  first  sight  unaccountable,  that  the  Hebrew  system, 
which  gave  at  least  a  conception  of  God  far  higher  than  SLuy 
which  elsewhere  obtained,  should  have  also  carefully  localized 
His  worship :  requiring  it  to  be  offered  in  the  Tabernacle,  and 
afterward  in  the  Temple ;  calling  up  the  people  in  annual  pro- 
cession  from  all  parts  of  the  land,  and  from  more  distant  regions, 
that  on  the  rocky  crown  of  Moriah,  in  courts  and  on  pavements  of 
human  construction,  they  might  offer  the  praise  which  it  would 
have  seemed  inevitable  to  feel  mis:ht  as  well  be  offered  on  the 
banks  of  the  Nile,  in  the  meadows  of  the  Euphrates,  in  any  Ro- 
man or  Syrian  city,  or  afar  upon  the  sea.     The  immediate  and 


124      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

Buffieient  explanation  of  it  is,  that  it  was  needful  thus  to  preserve 
unity  of  worship  among  the  Hebrews ;  and  that  the  entire  pro  r 
idential  plan,  of  which  that  unity  was  a  conditiorl,  could  only 
in  this  way  be  ultimately  accomplished. 

Therefore  the  Shekinah  had  been  in  the  Temple,  and  was 
never  in  the  synagogues.  Therefore  all  riches,  of  woods,  mar- 
bles, plates  and  chains  of  silver  and  gold,  were  assembled  in  the 
Temple.  And  therefore  to  that  they  must  go  np  to  worship, 
from  Kazareth  and  Hebron,  from  the  east  of  the  Jordan  or  the 
Philistine  coasts.  It  was  a  wise,  it  was  therefore  a  permanent 
«,nd  imperative  requirement ;  and  it  sank  so  deeply  into  the 
general  Hebrew  mind  that  to  change  this  rule,  or  deny  its  au- 
thority, would  have  seemed  as  absurd  as  to  deny  the  fountains 
of  Lebanon,  or  the  coolness  of  summer-snows  from  Hermon. 
The  disciples  of  Christianity  long  retained  this  fixed  and  con- 
fining ancestral  impression,  and  they  clung  to  the  Temple  as  the 
centre  of  worship,  after  they  had  otherwise  distinctly  separated 
from  the  Jewish  congregation.  According  to  the  record,  God 
had  to  drive  them  forth  from  Jerusalem  by  the  sharpness  of 
persecution,  to  break  the  strength  of  the  inherited  habit. 

This,  of  itself,  is  sufficient  to  show  how  vast  and  strange  was 
the  departure  from  all  preceding  custom  and  rule  when  the 
Master  said — or  was  very  early  reported  to  have  said — to  the 
woman  of  Samaria,  ^Not  in  this  mountain,  nor  3'et  at  Jerusa- 
lem, shall  men  specially  worship.'  But  it  was  as  perfectly  char- 
acteristic of  his  religion  as  any  word  ever  spoken  by  him.  It 
is  the  vivid  lesson  of  (Christianity,  a  lesson  illustrated  in  all  its 
development,  and  now  most  familiar,  that  no  place  is  peculiarly 
sacred :  that  worship  offered  in  the  spirit  of  love  is  everywhere 
accepted  of  God. 

It  is  impressive,  in  connection  with  this,  to  observe  what  special 
■care  was  taken,  if  one  so  may  express  it,  to  prevent  any  places, 
iissociated  with  the  great  Teacher  of  Christianity,  from  gaining 
a  sacredness  peculiar  to  themselves  in  the  eyes  of  his  followers, 
in  subsequent  ages.  The  mountains  of  Moab  still  look  upon 
Jerusalem,  and  the  Sea  of  Galilee  still  sleeps  as  of  old  in  silver 
loveliness  in  its  deep  basin,  girt  with  the  gray  and  purple  of  the 
Jiills.     Bethlehem  remains  on  its  verdant  slopes,  and  Nazareth 


TOWARD  GOBy  IN  WORSHIP.  125 

in  the  valley  to  which  travellers  bend  their  eager  steps  from  ah 
the  earth.  Enough  remains  to  attest  the  historical  character  of 
the  Faith,  and  to  illustrate  the  records  through  which  it  is  de- 
clared to  the  world.  But  no  one  spot  can  be  defined,  at  Jerusa- 
lem, Bethlehem,  Bethany,  Kazareth,  so  certainly  connected  with, 
the  life  of  the  Lord  that  there  worship  might  seem  most  signiti- 
cant.  The  house  of  the  workshop,  and  the  house  of  the  feast,, 
alike  have  vanished,  with  the  inn  in  whose  manger  lay  the  im- 
mortal babe.  The  hill  of  Calvary  cannot  be  surely  identified ; 
and  the  summit  of  Olivet  has  kept  no  more  trace  than  have  the 
glowing  heavens  above  of  that  Ascension  which  the  early  dis- 
ciples believed  at  least  to  have  made  it  illustrious.  One  can  no 
more  find  the  room  of  the  Supper  than  the  water-drops  which 
wet  the  disciples'  feet.  The  olive-trees  of  Gethsemane  can  be 
scarcely  the  same  beneath  which  passed  the  mysterious  agony. 
We  cannot  be  sure  of  the  place  of  the  sepulchre.  Tabor  itself 
we  are  only  confident  was  not  the  mount  of  Transfiguration. 

This  utter  obliteration  of  places  from  the  subsequent  knowl- 
edge of  mankind,  when  they  might,  if  identified,  have  seemed 
to  be  invested  with  unusual  sanctities,  is  intimately  connected 
with  that  entire  doctrine  of  worship  which  is  taught  by  Chiis- 
tianity  :  that  in  every  place  he  who  seeks  after  God,  and  works 
His  righteousness,  is  accepted  of  Rim :  that  in  church,  cottage, 
college,  camp,  on  sea  or  land,  around  the  world,  wherever  is 
adoring  affection  and  trust  toward  Him  on  high,  expressed  by 
the  aspiring  spirit,  there  is  true  worship. 

The  assembling  together  of  Christian  disciples,  for  the  anima* 
tion  of  common  affection  and  the  expression  of  common  praise, 
is  legitimate,  is  commanded:  and  from  such  assembling  the 
place  where  they  meet  takes  solemnity.  It  is  well  to  make  it 
stately  and  lovely :  a  Christian  impulse  to  make  it  so  noble  and 
ornate  that  it  may  be  outwardly  apt  for  its  purpose ;  to  make  it 
even  august  and  grand,  if  that  may  be,  beyond  the  measures  of 
fortress  or  palace.  The  basilica  was  its  first  form,  as  not  asso- 
ciated'in  the  thought  of  the  world  with  idolatrous  rites,  but  with 
secular  convocations,  public  justice.  But  it  has  been  an  impulse,, 
not  unnatural,  in  subsequent  centuries,  to  build  the  cross  into 
base  and  walls,  to  make  pillars  ascend  in  vertical  lines,  and  leap- 


126     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

ing  arches  point  upward  to  the  heavens,  to  blazon  the  windows 
with  the  crimson  and  gold  of  Christ's  blood  and  his  crown,  and 
to  make  the  very  stone  soar  up,  as  if  robbed  of  its  weight,  in 
that  ascending  tower  and  spire  of  which  no  heathen  architei^t 
thought.  But  still  the  house  takes  all  its  glory  from  its  purpose. 
The  assembly  of  believers  consecrates  it,  not  it  the  assembly. 
And  the  assembly  itself  is  to  foster  and  to  manifest  the  spirit  of 
praise  in  the  hearts  of  the  worshippers.  God,  according  to  this 
religion,  accepts  the  feeblest  whisper  of  love,  from  the  remotest 
wanderer  on  the  earth — accepts  the  silent  worship  of  the  house, 
most  unadorned,  in  which  the  meek  and  saintly  Friends  sit  in 
the  silence  of  the  Spirit — as  if  their  thought  and  holy  aspiration 
were  borne  up  on  the  noblest  notes  of  organ,  trumpet,  viol,  harp, 
in  the  grandest  and  oldest  cathedral  of  the  world. 

Of  course  this  seems  familiar  to  us.  It  is  so  because  Chris- 
tianity has  taught  us.  But  a  change  now  of  the  earth  and  the  sea — 
the  fluid  wave  becoming  solid,  the  solid  crag  dissolving  into  drops 
and  breaking  into  billows — would  hardly  be  a  change  more  amaz- 
ing  than  was  that  unexpectedly  introduced  when  the  Temple  lost 
its  preeminent  significance,  and  local  worship  its  peculiar  author- 
ity,  and  when  the  offering  of  the  heart  to  the  Highest  was  shown 
equally  fit,  and  equally  imperative,  in  every  hour  and  every 
place. 

It  is  of  course  to  be  noticed,  also,  that  the  purpose  of  wor- 
ship, as  concerning  the  worshipper,  is  always  the  same  under 
Christianity ;  a  purpose  peculiar  to  its  spirit  and  scheme,  and 
paramount  in  it.  It  is  to  hvin^  the  personal  soul,  in  its  in- 
tellectual and  spiritual  powers,  conscious  of  sin,  but  desiring 
holiness,  into  communion  with  the  mind  of  its  Author,  as  He  is 
presented  by  this  religion.  It  is  never,  what  has  been  excellently 
stated  as  the  purpose  of  physical  sacrifice,  'an  effort  to  make 
good  our  imperfect  devotion  of  ourselves  to  God,  by  means  of 
gifts.'  Men  feel,  so  far  as  enlightened  by  Christ,  that  nothing 
which  they  can  render  to  God  is  needed  by  Him,  but  that  He 
ordains  it  their  inestimable  privilege  to  rise  into  intimate  confer- 
ence with  Himself,  and  into  sympathy  with  His  heart,  through 
the  love  inspired  by  His  grace  and  declared  in  their  worship. 

So  it  was  with  the  earliest  assemblies  of  disciples,  at  Philippi 


TOWARD   aOB,  IN  WORSHIP.  127 

or  Corinth,  who  led  the  innumerable  multitudes  of  worshippers 
in  that  Europe  which  the  religion  confessed  bj  them  has  built 
to  its  modern  beautj  and  strength.  So  it  has  been,  from  their 
day  to  this,  and  is  to -day,  wherever  men  gather  in  the  light  of 
the  gospel  to  offer  to  God  affectionate  praise.  It  may  havt 
passed,  in  a  measure — I  fear  it  has — from  the  consciousness  ot 
those  who  now  seek  the  churches  for  social  enjoyment,  for 
literary  culture,  or  to  fulfil  a  recognized  duty.  But  the  solemn 
and  fruitful  office  of  worship  is  still,  as  of  old,  under  Christi- 
anity, to  bring  men  to  God  in  this  sympathy  of  the  spirit ;  and 
however  they  may  be  sometimes  allured  by  pomp  of  ritual, 
splendor  of  vestments,  eloquence  of  discourse,  magnificent 
buildings,  they  feel  instinctively  that  they  have  not  worshipped 
if  the  finest  artistic  and  rhythmic  effects  of  song  and  sermon,  or 
of  opulent  ceremonial,  have  not  detached  them  in  spirit  from 
the  earth,  and  exalted  them  to  God.  On  the  other  hand,  no 
matter  how  plain  the  discourse,  how  bare  the  ceremonial,  how 
mean  the  surroundings,  if  men  have  there  through  worship 
found  God,  and  felt  within  that  ecstasy  of  praise  which  pre- 
ludes a  something  more  celestial,  the  place  is  sacred,  the  service 
sublime,  the  hour  prophetic  of  Immortality. 

This  is  the  office  of  Christian  worship,  as  recognized  where 
this  religion  has  gone ;  and  this  is  an  office,  I  need  hardly  remind 
jou,  not  contemplated  as  possible  in  most  ethnic  religions,  not 
accepted  as  desii-able  even  if  possible.  The  Pythian  priestess 
could  only  hear  and  recite  the  message  of  the  god,  with  convul- 
sion and  paroxysm.  The  very  goats,  approaching  the  oracle, 
were  said,  you  know,  to  shiver  and  leap,  as  if  in  epilepsy ;  and 
he  who  entered  the  cave  of  Trophonius,  as  Pausanias  did,  had 
been  rumored  never  afterward  to  be  known  to  smile.  The 
thought  of  coming  to  communion  with  Powers  Unseen,  with* 
out  offering  of  sacrifice,  by  the  worship  of  love,  and  of  finding  in 
this  succor  and  uplift,  a  divine  strength  and  a  holy  exultation — 
it  was  known  only  among  the  Hebrews,  and  even  among  them 
but  by  elect  spirits,  and  then  imperfectly.  But  it  became  the 
common  inheritance  of  all  to  whom  Christianity  was  preached, 
and  is  as  familiar  to  the  best  modern  thought  as  is  the  joy  of 
converse  with  friends. 


128      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  I UTY  OF  MAN 

Undoubtedly  the  nearest  approach  to  it  elsewhere  was  in  the 
ancient  religion  of  India,  where  the  Absolute  Intelligence  was 
conceived  as  absorbed  in  rest  and  contemplation,  to  be  ap- 
proached by  intense  and  continuous  separation  of  thought  from 
outward  things.  The  power  for  this,  as  I  have  suggest-ed,  was 
supposed  to  pertain  to  particular  men ;  and  the  Hindu  insti- 
tutes are -a  system  of  disciphne,  designed  to  assist  those  compe- 
tent for  it  to  fulfil  the  vocation,  and  to  goverr  <-he  relations  of 
others  to  them.  This,  under  Brahmanism.  Buddhism,  though 
essentially  atheistic,  had  a  similar  theory  of  an  immemorial 
light  and  wisdom,  to  be  approached  by  contemplation ;  and,  as 
it  opened  this  to  all,  distinctions  of  rank  and  of  priesthood  dis- 
appear, in  its  earlier  form.  But  in  both  these  religions  it  was  a 
pantheistic  absorption  into  the  impersonal  being  of  the  universe 
which  was  desired  and  sought,  rather  than  the  rational  commu- 
nion of  the  soul  with  an  infinite  Creator.  In  each,  and  both, 
the  proposed  contemplation  aimed  at  the  loss  of  individual  con- 
sciousness ;  as  Buddha  said,  in  the  final  consummation  of  his  ex- 
perience on  earth,  *  I  am  delivered  from  the  influence  of  the  world 
of  matter,  of  the  world  of  passions,  and  from  every  influence 

that  causes  the  migration  from  one  existence  to  another 

I  have  mastered  existence  itself,  by  destroying  the  principle 
that  causes  it.'  *  I^o  temper  prompting  to  affectionate  trust  or 
to  ardent  joy,  in  a  Supreme  Person,  in  the  midst  of  intelligent 
labor  and  sacriflce,  was  possible  here.  If  Gautama  said,  as  has 
been  reported,  '  let  all  sins  committed  in  the  world  fall  on  me, 
that  the  world  may  be  delivered,'  he  reached  therein  the  sublime 
summits  of  human  character;  he  showed  himself  allied  in  spirit 
with  the  later  and  greater  Teacher  of  Christianity ;  allied  with 
Paul,  who  could  wish  himself  accursed  for  his  brethren's  sake. 
But  he  could  not  say,  as  did  one  who  followed,  ^*  If  a  man  love 
me,  he  will  keep  my  words  ;  and  my  Father  will  love  him,  and 
we  will  come  unto  him,  and  make  our  abode  with  him."t  He  did 
not  say,  plainly  because  he  could  not,  "  The  Holy  Ghost,  whom 
the  Father  will  send  in  my  name,  He  shall  teach  yon  all  things, 


*  Bp.  Bigandet's  "  Legend  of  Gaudama  "  :  London  ed.,   1880  ;  Vol.  11^ 
p.  31. 
t  John  xiv.  23 


TOWARD    GOB,    IN  WORSHIP.  129 

and  bring  all  things  to  your  remembrance."*  And  no  angel 
has  ever  been  seen  in  the  air,  in  Buddhistic  apocalypse,  flying  in 
the  midst  of  heaven,  and  calling  to  all  that  dwell  upon  the 
earth  to  worship  God,  and  give  glory  to  Him :  while  above,  in 
the  heavens  from  which  he  came,  is  the  voice  also  of  many 
waters,  and  of  a  great  thunder,  as  they  sing  a  new  song  before 
the  throne. 

This  worship  which  Christianity  introduced  to  the  world,  and 
which  has  since  become  familiar  wherever  this  religion  has  gone — ■ 
without  outward  sacrifice,  but  calling  for  inward  consecration  of 
the  spirit,  springing  from  love,  expressing  itself  with  joyful 
freedom  in  any  place,  and  aiming  always  to  bring  the  worshipper 
into  transforming  communion  with  God — has  to  do,  of  course, 
with  all  the  life  of  him  in  whom  its  precept  is  obeyed.  No  rad- 
ical divorce  is  possible  under  it,  however  hard  the  fact  to  be 
recognized,  between  worship  and  the  practical  service  of  life ; 
between  religion  and  morality ;  between  that  which  is  expressed 
in  the  Lord's-Day  assembly,  and  that  which  is  done  in  the  office 
or  on  the  street.  At  no  one  point  does  Christianity  encounter 
more  subtle  and  unrelenting  resistance  than  at  this,  from  those 
who  would  like  to  make  their  worship  a  thing  apart,  casting  a 
kind  of  iridescence  over  life,  but  not  penetrating,  imbuing,  and 
vitally  shaping  it  with  a  sovereign  force.  At  no  one  point  is 
the  religion  more  emphatic — not  in  the  way  of  precept  only, 
but  by  the  essential  force  of  its  nature — than  in  making  all  life 
properly  subordinate  to  the  law  of  worship,  all  worship  imper- 
fect to  which  such  regency  is  not  conceded.  It  is  the  old  hea- 
thenism which  breaks  again  into  view  when  the  same  man  is  a 
worshipper  in  the  chapel,  as  in  Greece  or  in  Spain,  and  a  brigand 
in  the  field  ;  or  when  the  same  man,  as  may  happen  among  us, 
is  touched  with  devout  sentiment  in  the  church,  but  is  sharp, 
unscrupulous,  and  false  with  his  fellows.  Christianity  no  more 
recognizes  this  as  obedience  to  its  law  than  Art  recognizes  a 
gilded  background,  with  blotches  of  irrelative  or  contradictory 
colors,  as  an  ideal  picture ;  than  Cities  recognize  cheating  and 
conflagration  as  the  justifying  purpose  in  their  erection.    Man 


♦  J.hn  xiv.  26. 
9 


130      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  MAN 

cannot  worship  God  in  spirit,  according  to  the  Master's  rnle^ 
without  showing  that  worship  in  daily  donjestic  or  public  life. 
The  temper  within,  if  regnant  and  sincere,  must  pervade  and 
control  the  outward  life :  as  the  force  of  gravitation  holds  not 
only  the  mountain  in  its  place,  or  the  ocean  in  its  bed,  but  every 
grain  of  sand  on  the  beach,  and  every  wreath  of  delicate  mist 
which  the  sun  pencils  with  rainbow  tints. 

It  may  be  hard,  it  is  hard,  for  man  to  accomplish  this  lofty 
ideal  of  a  life-long  worship,  with  which  the  religion  of  Jesus  is 
instinct.  But  it  is  its  ideal.  It  has  been  realized,  measurably 
at  least,  millions  of  times ;  not  so  much  by  those  who  retired 
from  the  world  to  give  their  nights  and  days  to  praise,  as  by 
those  who  walked  with  joyful  worship  in  the  courts  of  God's 
House,  and  then  with  the  same  adoring  love  and  holy  gladness 
in  the  common  paths  of  household  life,  or  amid  the  extremest 
stress  of  affairs ;  who  have  served  God  in  secret  as  well  as  in 
public,  and  have  found  '  on  the  roadside  a  place  to  kneel,  as  fit 
as  on  the  pavement  of  the  Milky  Way.'  Ethics  with  them  have 
been  spiritualized  by  faith.  Consecration  has  given  impulse 
and  glow  to  the  manifold  details  of  obedience.  All  life  has 
been  worship ;  and  communion  with  God,  beginning  day  by 
day  with  each  wakening  of  consciousness,  has  only  closed  as  that 
consciousness  passed  into  the  realms  of  sleep  and  dreams. 

This  has  been  realized,  and  will  be  hereafter,  in  ever-increas- 
ing multitudes  of  disciples.  But  if  it  had*  never  once  been 
reached,  since  martyr-ages,  it  would  still  remain  true  that  this  is 
the  Christian  law  of  Worship,  and  that  only  in  those  who  strive 
with  utmost  eagerness  to  fulfil  it  does  that  law  find  its  real 
exhibition. 

It  is  thus  that  it  works,  this  new  religion,  to  conquer  the 
earth  to  allegiance  to  itself,  and  at  the  same  time  to  bless  and 
transfigure  the  whole  majestic  frame  of  society.  It  was  by  wor 
ship,  more  than  by  doctrine — or  rather  by  that  doctrine,  gaining 
inspiring  exhibition  in  worship — that  the  old  superstitions,  de- 
basing and  baneful,  were  expelled  from  men's  minds :  the  obser- 
vation of  meteors,  or  monster-births,  the  consultation  of  flights 
of  birds,  or  of  human  entrails.  By  it,  the  Church  conquered 
Montanism  on  the  one  hand,  with  its  narrowness  and  rigidity, 


TOWARD    GOD,   IN  WOESHfP.  131 

and  Gnosticism  on  the  other,  with  its  licentious  liberality,  and 
became  in  the  grandest  sense  popular  and  catholic.  It  was  by 
this  that  it  gave  its  quickening  teaching  to  all,  '  instructing  arti- 
sans and  old  women,'  as  was  said,  scornfully  sometimes,  some, 
times  gladly,  4n  the  mysteries  of  religion.'  It  was  by  this  that 
it  knit  together,  into  one  body,  those  of  diverse  ranks,  races,  and 
tongues,  whom  it  attracted,  whom  it  impressed,  by  the  tender- 
ness and  spiritual  sublimity  of  its  prayers,  by  the  solemn  and 
jubilant  voice  of  its  praise.  Constantino,  who  honored  it  as  '  the 
most  devout  of  religions,'  felt  this  peculiar  elevation  and  charm 
in  its  worship.  An  echo  to  it  was  in  his  own  words  on  memorable 
occasions.  It  impressed  him  as  full  of  exuberant  life.  He  saw 
the  mighty  motive  in  it,  which  shot  its  energy  into  all  forms. 
He  recognized,  in  a  measure  at  least,  the  magnificent  purpose 
which  made  it  vital,  which  has  made  it  enduring.  He  expected 
its  success.  But  its  subsequent  victories,  won  largely,  on  tho 
human  side,  through  the  instrumentality  of  what  is  peculiar  and 
sublime  in  its  Worship,  have  been  such  as  he  could  scarcely  have 
prefigured.  At  a  subsequent  time  it  ruled  and  ennobled  the 
very  languages  of  the  continent.  More  than  anything  else  it 
mastered  the  savagery,  and  dissolved  the  solidity,  of  feudal  estab- 
lishments. More  than  anything  else  it  has  inspired  and  educa- 
ted peoples.  It  has  put  the  loftiest  thought  of  the  world  into 
the  noblest  forms  of  letters.  You  hear  its  echoes  in  Dante,  and 
in  Milton.  You  catch  its  strains  in  the  sweetest  songs  of  every 
communion.     You  see  its  work  in  advancing  Christendom. 

"  Urbs  beata  Hirusalem, 
Dicta  pacis  visio, 
Quae  construitur  in  Coelis, 
Vivis  ex  lapidibus — " 

are  lines  of  a  Latin  hymn,  of  about  the  eighth  century,  by  an  un- 
known author.  It  was  to  build  the  blessed  and  holy  City  of 
God  in  all  the  earth,  preparing  for  that  which  is  supreme  in  the 
heavens,  that  Gregorian  and  Ambrosian  chants  arose;  that 
preacher  taught,  and  singer  sang,  while  churches  prayed,  apolo- 
gists argued,  martyrs  died.  It  is  by  that  worship  that  the  bar- 
barons  now  are  most  deeply  impressed,  as  the  untaught  heathen 


132      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  IHE  DUTY  OF  MAN. 

of  distant  islands,  or  of  our  own  cities,  hear  in  it  strains  as  of  the 
angels  singing  still.  And  by  that  worship,  cariied  into  life,  all 
action,  all  history,  shall  finally  become,  if  this  religion  shall  evei 
get  to  its  predicted  perfect  supremacy,  at  once  glorious  and  pure. 
Then  laws  shall  repeat  it.  Life  shall  infold  it.  The  mightiest  and 
the  meanest,  pervaded  by  its  spirit,  and  uniting  in  its  harmonies, 
shall  be  one  in  its  courts.  The  rule  of  Worship  in  this  religion, 
preached  from  Palestine,  will  then  reveal  its  perfect  glory 
as  measured  with  that  of  any  other  known  on  earth  ;  as  measured 
with  that  of  the  loftiect  conceptions  which  man  can  form.  And 
then  the  world,  in  all  its  social  and  public  life,  in  secular  enter- 
pi-ise,  in  literature,  in  art,  as  well  as  in  private  and  household  ex- 
pen'ence,  shall  be  like  the  King's  daughter  of  the  psalm,  "  all 
glonous  within." 

Do  you  say,  ^  It  is  ideal '  ?  It  is  the  Ideal  for  which  the  Lord 
gave  up  his  life !  It  is  the  Ideal  w^ith  which  his  religion  is  as 
separate  and  vivid  as  the  sky  with  its  blue,  or  as  the  sun  with  its 
radiant  light.  A  consummation  like  that  is  worth  working  for, 
praying  for,  dying  to  hasten  I  It  will  not  come  as  an  exhala- 
tion, rising  to  the  soft  impulse  of  lute  and  dulcimer.  It  will 
only  come  as  the  answering  result  to  faithful  heroic  endurance 
and  work,  in  those  who  honor  and  love  the  Lord.  But  this — 
even  this! — foreseen  from  Judea,  shall  come  at  last:  the  planet 
itself  the  final  vast  terrestrial  temple :  the  sacrifices  of  Praise 
which  rise  within  it,  from  loving,  lowly,  and  triumphing  hearts, 
conscious  of  sin  but  confident  in  grace,  the  prelude  of  the  song  to 
be  heard  by  and  by,  when  they  who  now  adore  and  serve  before  the 
glory  revealed  through  Christ,  shall  rise  to  more  ecstatic  worship, 
as  with  tne  Church,  at  last  Triumphant,  they  see  the  Almighty 
face  to  face ! 


LECTURE    V 


THE  NEW  CONCEPTION   OF  MAN'S    DUTY  TO   MAN, 
IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY. 


LECTURE  V. 

That  a  nobler  conception  of  the  duty  which  man  owes  to 
(rod,  in  the  vast  and  vital  department  of  Worship,  has  been  in- 
troduced and  maintained  by  Christianity,  this  may  be  admitted 
by  those  who  will  still  be  prompt  to  deny  that  any  change  cor- 
responding to  this  has  been  wrought  by  the  religion  in  the  prac- 
tical impression  obtaining  among  men  as  to  the  duties  which 
they  owe  to  each  other.  Man  stands  toward  man,  such  will 
affirm,  substantially  as  he  did  in  the  days  before  Jesus ;  or,  if 
there  has  here  been  any  change,  it  has  been  the  result  of  a  gen- 
eral natural  advance  of  society,  of  improvements  in  the  arts,  the 
expansion  of  commerce,  a  wider  and  wiser  practical  philosopny ; 
and  it  is  not  to  be  attributed,  unless  by  some  too  zealous  dis- 
ciple, to  the  teachings,  the  spirit,  and  the  positive  impulse  of  the 
distinctive  religion  of  the  Christ.  Empires  as  tyrannous,  and  re- 
bellions against  them  as  furious  and  sanguinary,  as  before  had 
been  known,  have  since  appeared ;  and  the  pages  of  history  are 
lurid  and  bloody  with  the  terrible  story.  Personal  regard  for  the 
rights  of  others  has  scarcely  become  more  general  or  effective. 
Domestic  life  was  as  intimate  and  sweet,  and  morally  as  fruitful, 
in  Greek  or  Roman  or  Hebrew  times  as  it  has  been  since ;  and 
justice  was  as  carefully  administered  in  the  courts,  when  an  ap- 
pellant complained  of  an  injury,  or  when  society  took  imme- 
diate cognizance  of  crime.  In  fact  the  Roman  Law — largely 
anticipating  in  its  development  any  general  control  of  Christi- 
anity over  men,  and  presenting  simply  the  matured  public  reason 
of  the  empire  in  the  domain  of  jurisprudence — ^has  had  large 
sway  in  modern  Europe,  and  is  at  the  base  of  much  of  its  juridical 
doctrine  and  life.  It  has  had  a  degree  of  authority  even  in 
England,  and  with  us ;  though  the  ancestral  Common  Law,  pro- 

(135) 


136     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

teeted  in  its  early  insular  home,  and  more  germane  to  tbe  spirit 
of  the  people,  has  not  allowed  it  to  gain  such  authority,  there 
or  here,  as  it  elsewhere  has  had. 

In  a  word  it  may  be  said,  reply  these  critics,  that  the  genera! 
recognition,  and  the  practical  acceptance,  of  the  duty  which  man 
owes  to  man,  has  hardly  been  clearer,  wider,  finer,  than  they 
were  before  Christianity  came;  or  if  there  has  been  any  ad 
vance,  it  is  due,  as  suggested,  not  to  it,  but  to  influences  separable 
from  it,  which  began  to  appear  at  about  the  same  time  in  the 
sphere  of  affairs.  Whatever  the  religion  may  have  done  for 
man  in  his  attitude  toward  God,  instructing  and  uplifting  him, 
it  has  scarcely  affected  him  in  the  relation  which  he  holds  to- 
ward Man. 

It  must  be  granted  that  there  seems  much  reason  for  such 
impressions ;  and  that  he  who  reads  history  from  the  point  of 
view  presented  by  the  lessons  and  the  spirit  of  Jesus, — espec- 
ially if  he  reads  it  with  any  affirmative  pre-conception  as  to  the 
celestial  character  of  Christianity,  and  as  to  the  effects  which  such 
a  religion  ought  to  have  produced  upon  human  society, — will 
be  likely  to  find  himself  sharply  disappointed  in  the  evident 
result :  as  he  sees  kingdom  arrayed  against  kingdom,  and  the 
turbulence  of  vice  yet  unconquered  in  any ;  as  he  sees  the  robber 
still  successful  in  his  violence,  and  the  villain  in  his  craft,  the 
assassin  still  gratifying  his  deadly  thirst,  the  weak  still  overcome 
by  the  strong,  the  innocent  sacrificed  to  the  arts  of  the  guilty, 
and  the  menacing  figures  of  human  passion  as  busy  as  ever,  and 
almost  as  commanding,  in  the  picture  of  the  ages. 

But  we  must  not  expect,  it  were  surely  unphilosophical  to  ex- 
pect, that  the  sudden  coming  of  even  a  Divine  religion  would 
have  power  at  once  to  remove  from  society  incrusted  abuses,  to 
remodel  usages  long  established,  and  to  rectify  the  habitual  life 
of  mankind.  Supposing  that  coming  to  have  been  occasioned 
by  a  real  mental  and  moral  need  on  the  part  of  him  to  whom 
the  religion  was  addressed,  it  hardly  could  be  that  such  a  need, 
in  vast  communities,  should  be  supplied  in  a  period  less  than  of 
many  generations.  It  must  be  presumed  that  time  would  be 
required,  and  long  intervals  of  time,  before  the  vital  root  and 
substance  of  personal  and  of  public  character  could  be  impene- 


m  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  137 

trated  by  sucb  a  new  force,  so  that  society,  in  its  immense  com- 
plex, should  be  re-fashioned  according  to  its  law.  It  is  only 
fair  to  count  upon  this;  and  the  greater  the  need  of  such  a  re- 
ligion, the  ampler  the  probability  thence  derived  that  the  Divine 
wisdom  would  proclaim  such,  the  longer  must  be  the  necessary 
interval  before  it  can  exhibit  its  normal  supremacy.  Till  the 
end  is  reached,  it  can  show  but  occasional  and  particular  effects ;  a 
few  snatches  and  airs,  it  may  be,  but  not  the  final  mighty  music  ; 
a  few  brilliant  angles  and  facettes,  but  by  no  means  the  consum- 
mate crystal. 

I^Tature  herself  may  here  instruct  us.  It  is  already  many 
weeks  since  the  earth  on  these  parallels  turned  toward  the  sun, 
at  that  point  in  the  year  where  the  custom  of  Christendom  has 
located  also  the  traditional  observance  of  the  advent  of  Jesus.* 
"But  summer  has  not  come,  as  yet.  The  cold  and  storm  which 
have  smitten  and  benumbed  the  earth  since  that  memorable  date 
have  been  only  harsher  and  more  tempestuous  than  those  which 
preceded.  We  shiver  still,  at  intervals  at  least,  in  the  gripe  of 
an  atmosphere  that  seems  to  have  drifted  into  our  latitudes  upon 
the  fields  of  unbroken  ice,  or  to  have  dropped  in  conquering 
frigor  from  aerial  regions  untouched  of  sunshine.  It  is  still  by 
only  a  long  look  forward  that  we  anticipate  the  summer  blooms^^ 
fragrance,  and  fruitage,  which  yet  at  last  shall  surely  appear. 
So,  I  think,  it  might  have  been  expected  that  only  more  im- 
petuous and  severe  would  be  occasional  blasts  of  passion,  only 
more  intense  some  chills  of  man's  selfishness,  after  the  light  of 
a  celestial  religion  had  dawned  on  the  world.  Generations  must 
pass,  centuries  even,  before  its  benign  and  salutary  force  can 
vitalize  and  reform  the  vast  social  systems  whose  condition  of 
need  had  occasioned  its  coming.  Only  here  and  there,  in  spots 
and  at  intervals,  can  its  full  power  be  expected  to  be  shown ; 
as  we  find  already,  here  and  there,  a  patch  of  cultured  and 
sheltered  soil,  green  with  the  promise  of  the  affluent  summer ; 
as  we  walk  now  and  then  already,  for  a  day,  amid  a  brilliant 
and  balmy  air  that  seems  to  have  sallied  from  the  tropics  to 
meet  us. 


*  The  lecture  was  first  delivered  on  an  evening  in  Marcli. 


138    THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

Such  sweet  and  prophetic  parentheses  in  history  we  may  ex- 
pect, where  the  Christian  rehgion  has  conquered,  in  instances, 
the  selfish  passion  which  it  came  to  subdue.  But  more  than 
this  we  can  hardly,  I  think,  reasonably  anticipate,  until  that  re- 
ligion, riding  like  the  sun  to  its  perfect  meridian,  shall  illumine 
the  world  ;  sliining  in  its  celestial  efi*ulgence — if  such  shall  at 
last  be  found  to  belong  to  it — the  quickener  of  love,  and  the 
regent  of  peace.  I  do  not  now  affirm  that  it  is  such  a  relii^'Ion. 
I  simply  affirm,  what  all  must  admit,  that  if  it  be  such,  this  will 
be  the  natural  course  of  its  influence  on  the  history  which  it  was 
sent  to  reconstruct. 

That  such  partial  effects,  special,  imperfect,  yet  not  unim- 
portant, and  of  a  character  nowise  uncertain,  have  been  accom- 
plished under  Christianity,  it  seems  to  me  impossible  to  doubt, 
dreary  and  dark  as  have  been  often  the  passing  centuries  since 
its  new  accents  were  heard  in  the  air.  I  am  confident  that  with 
no  prepossessions  whatever  on  behalf  of  Christianity — if  such 
attitude  of  mind  were  possible  to  us — we  should  be  constrained 
to  recognize  this. 

In  illustration  of  it,  observe  some  effects  accomplished  by  this 
religion,  in  instances  where  its  moral  force  most  distinctly  col- 
lides with  physical  strength,  and  with  established  and  armed 
custom,  on  behalf  of  the  rightful  claim  of  weakness ;  and,  for  the 
first  instance,  take  as  a  striking,  one  would  almost  say  an  en- 
tirely incontrovertible  example,  the  now  recognized  duty  of 
Christian  society  toward  little  Children ;  toward  all  children  born 
within  it :  and  compare  this  with  anything  of  the  sort  which  ex- 
isted in  the  world  before  Jesus  was  born.  It  seems  to  me  that 
we  must  be  impressed  with  the  vastness  and  the  permanence  of 
this  most  radical  and  most  fruitful  of  changes. 

In  the  Home  of  the  splendid  time  of  Augustus  childhood  had 
practically  no  other  rights  than  the  carelessness  or  the  sentiment 
of  the  father  might  fitfully  concede.  To  the  father,  as  magis- 
trate of  the  household,  belonged  an  utter  authority,  over  liberty, 
over  personal  gecurity,  and  even  over  life.  The  law  of  the  Twelve 
Tables  had  expressly  authorized  him  to  either  abandon  or  kill 
his  children,  if  he  preferred  not  to  rear  them  ;  as  the  Emperor 
Claudius,  suspecting  the  faithfulness  of  his  wife  Urgulanilla, 


m  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  139 

ordered  the  daughter  who  had  been  born  of  her  to  be  stripped 
and  exposed.  It  was  a  rule,  correlative  to  this,  that  whoever 
picked  up  a  child  thus  deserted  might  keep  it  for  a  slave.  When 
retained  in  the  house,  children  were  under  the  tutelage  of  slaves, 
with  whom  their  relations  were  unrestrained ;  and  they  learned 
vice,  and  exercised  cruelty,  with  a  freedom  sufficient  of  itself  to 
explain  the  decadence  of  that  haughty  state  which  had  subjected 
to  its  will  not  only  barbarous  tribes  but  cultivated  nations,  and 
had  made  itself  rich  from  their  resources. 

No  thought  whatever  of  the  sacredness  of  childhood,  of  the 
debt  which  is  due  to  it  from  the  state,  appears  in  the  Roman 
philosophy  or  law.  In  all  the  range  of  classical  poetry  there  is 
scarcely  a  line  upon  that  theme,  to  us  so  familiar,  of  the  beauty 
of  life's  morning,  when  to  the  child,  '  so  exquisitely  wild,' 

'*  the  boat 

May  rather  seem 
To  brood  on  air,  than  on  an  earthly  stream."  * 

Cicero  spoke  of  it  as  the  natural  feeling  that  if  a  child  died 
young  it  was  no  cause  for  grief ;  if  it  died  in  the  cradle,  it  was 
matter  of  entire  unconcern.  Octavius,  father  of  Augustus, 
either  seriously  thought  of  killing  in  his  infancy  the  boy  whose 
subsequent  beauty  gives  loveliness  to  the  marble,  or  he  smartly 
threatened  it,  because  the  Senator  Nigidius  Figulus  had  pre- 
dicted for  the  babe  future  lordship  in  Rome.  The  general  facts 
have  nowhere  been  set  forth  more  lucidly  or  correctly  than  by 
Gibbon,  in  his  Forty-fourth  chapter.  '^  In  the  forum,  the  Senate, 
or  the  camp,"  he  says,  "  the  adult  son  of  a  Roman  citizen  enjoyed 
the  public  and  private  rights  of  a  person ;  in  his  father's  houye 
he  was  a  mere  thing;  confounded  by  the  laws  with  the  mov- 
ables, the  cattle,  and  the  slaves,  whom  the  capricious  master 
might  alienate  or  destroy,  without   being   responsible  to  any 

earthly  tribunal The  majesty  of  a  parent  was   armed 

with  the  power  of  life  and  death ;  and  the  examples  of  such 
bloody  executions,  which  were  sometimes  praised  and  never 
punished,  may  be  traced  in  the  annals  of  Rome  beyond  the 


*  Wordsworth :  "  To  H.  C,  six  years  old. 


140     THE  NE]Y  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

times  of  Pompey  and  Augustus."  "The  exposition  of  cliil. 
dren,"  he  further  says,  "was  the  prevailing  and  stubborn  vice  of 
fi,ntiquity  ;  it  was  sometimes  prescribed,  often  permitted,  ahnost 
always  practiced  with  impunity,  by  the  nations  who  never  enter- 
tained the  Roman  ideas  of  paternal  power;  and  the  dramatic 
poets,  who  appeal  to  the  human  heart,  represent  with  indifFer 
ence  a  popular  custom  which  was  palliated  by  the  motives  of 
economy  and  compassion."^ 

Nor  is  it  to  be  imagined  that  this  attitude  toward  children  was 
peculiar  to  the  Eoman,  a  fruit  of  that  fierceness  and  hardness  of 
will  which  had  made  him  the  unchecked  conqueror  of  the 
nations ;  for  it  is  to  be  observed  that  it  was  as  common  in  the 
Hellenic  states  as  ever  on  the  Tiber.  It  was  not  in  Sparta,  only, 
that  children  might  be  whipped  at  the  altar  of  Diana  till  their 
life-blood  ran  on  the  steps  of  the  altar.  It  was  not  alone  on  the 
forest-sides  of  Mt.  Taygetus,  or  in  the  rocky  caverns  at  its  base, 
under  the  methodical  ferocity  of  the  Peninsula,  that  weak  or 
sickly  children  were  exposed,  to  be  torn  by  wild  beasts,  to  die  of 
hunger,  or  to  perish  in  the  blast.  Plato,  and  Aristotle,  con- 
summate masters  of  Attic  thought,  whose  names  outshine  in 
signal  respects  those  of  all  their  successors,  expressly  approve  of 
such  abandonment  of  children,  in  case  the  parents  are  unable  to 
support  them,  or  if  they  fail  to  give  physical  promise  of  service 
to  the  State.  The  doctrine  of  Plato  is,  that  a  child  belongs  less 
to  his  parents  than  to  the  city,  the  latter  having  need  of  him 
for  its  advancement,  for  which  reason  even  his  infantile  sports 
are  proper  subjects  for  public  regulation  ;  while  Poman  moral- 
ists, on  whom  Greek  influences  had  descended,  including  even 
Seneca  himself,  speak  as  of  course,  without  any  denunciation, 
of  the  exposure  of  children  if  sickly  or  deformed.  It  is  on 
such  exposure  of  a  son,  you  remember,  on  Mount  Cithseron, 
that  the  memorable  (Edipus  tragedies  are  based.  The  law  which 
permitted  a  father  to  sell  or  expel  his  son  at  pleasure  was  a  law 
in  Greece  as  well  as  in  Pome.  The  father  had  the  right,  in  the 
one  as  in  the  other,  to  accept  or  reject  the  child  at  its  birth  ;  the 
right  to  give  son  or  daughter  in  marriage,  without  debate  ;  the 
right  to  exclude  the  son  from  the  household,  even  at  his  matur- 

*  London  ed.,  1848 :  Vol.  V.:  pp.  387,  391. 


m  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  141 

ity,  and  adopt  another  in  his  place.  Natural  affection  was  not 
the  organizing  principle  of  the  family,  in  the  contemplation  oi 
ancient  law,  either  in  Europe,  or  in  the  East.  But  the  family 
was  based  on  the  domestic  religion — on  the  w^orship,  that  is, 
offered  to  ancestors ;  and  was  maintained  as  subservient  to  the 
State.  So  the  laws  of  Menu  described  the  oldest  son  as  one 
who  is  begotten  for  the  performance  of  a  duty,  that  the  worship 
due  to  the  dead  may  be  offered,  because  of  which  he  has  con- 
trol of  the  patrimony. 

Of  course  in  societies  so  founded  and  organized,  and  morally 
ruled  by  such  conceptions  of  the  gods  as  obtained  among  them, 
there  could  be  no  effective  recognition  of  public  duty  toward 
the  feebleness  of  childhood,  or  of  immediate  rights  in  infants  to 
protection,  training,  succor,  and  nurture.  The  human  heart  was 
not  wholly  transformed,  nor  its  innate  sensibilities  destroyed. 
Natural  affection  was  an  instinct  and  a  power  in  the  most  sav- 
age tribes.  It  could  not  be  wholly  or  permanently  wanting 
amid  Attic  culture,  or  at  the  centres  of  Eoman  power.  Many  a 
mother,  no  doubt,  held  in  her  heart  of  hearts  the  son  or  the 
daughter  who  was  only  the  dearer  by  reason  of  sickness,  or  of 
natural  infirmity.  Many  a  father,  of  nobler  nature  than  the 
religion  which  he  had  inherited,  must  have  felt  his  children  as 
dear  to  him  as  his  life,  and  have  shrunk,  as  the  hand  shrinks 
from  fire,  from  any  injustice  6r  cruelty  toward  them.  But  the 
customs,  legislations,  and  spirit  of  society  were  not  even  a  de- 
fence for  life  itself  in  its  earlier  years ;  and  the  characteristic 
tone  of  literature,  as  it  was  carried  at  that  very  time  toward 
almost  its  highest  historical  development,  shows  how  haughtily 
careless  society  was,  in  what  we  call  the  classic  ages,  of  what  to 
us  appears  its  imperative  and  primary  duty.  Care  for  the  child, 
when  required  at  all,  was  so  only  because  of  the  citizenship 
which  was  about  to  be  his.  I  doubt  if  any  parallel  can  be 
found,  in  all  the  stately  treasure-houses  of  ancient  sculpture,  to 
that  carved  cradle  in  Westminster  Abbey,  in  the  splendid  chapel 
oi  Henry  Seventh,  not  far  from  the  famous  monument  of  Eliza- 
beth, in  which  lies  sculptured  the  sleeping  figure  of  the  little 
Sophia,  the  baby-daughter  of  James  First,  whose  life  had  gone 
out  almost  at  the  beginning. 


142     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

Not  till  Christianity  liad  begun  to  affect  with  beneficent  force 
the  Roman  Empire,  touching  with  subtile  invisible  energy  even 
those  who  were  quite  unconscious  of  the  fact — as  the  currents  oi 
the  Gulf-stream  clothe  with  beauty  the  very  rocks  which  repulsi 
them,  in  the  Hebrides,  or  within  the  IS'orwegian  fiords, — not  till 
then  did  affection  for  children  find  expression  in  literature,  and 
care  for  children  become  the  custom  of  the  great.  Then  Trajan 
attempted  to  give  an  unpurchased  freedom  to  the  children  of  free 
parents,  deserted,  but  preserved.  He  even  established  a  fund  for 
the  maintenance  of  poor  girls  and  boys,  and  was  portrayed  on 
coins  and  monuments  raising  from  the  ground  women  kneeling 
with  their  children.  Pliny,  with  no  doubt  other  citizens  of  a 
generous  opulence,  followed  at  a  distance  his  example.  Hadrian 
increased  moderately  the  bounties  for  this  purpose.  Antoninus 
Pius  augmented  them  still  further;  and  Marcus  Aurelius  put 
such  endowments  under  the  charge  of  Consular  officers,  and  set 
apart  fresh  funds  for  the  purpose — while  he  wrote  to  his  friend 
and  teacher  Pronto  of  his  happiness  in  the  health  of  his  little 
girls,  and  Pronto  in  turn  sends  kisses  to  '  their  fat  little  toes  and 
tiny  hands,'  and  recalls  the  merry  sound  of  their  prattle.  Aure- 
lius appointed  a  praetor  to  watch  expressly  over  orphans,  and  re- 
quired a  registration  of  births.  A  bas-relief  at  Rome  is  believed 
to  show  thepuellcB  FaustiniancB  clustering  around  the  figure  of 
the  Empress,  from  whom  the  name  had  been  derived. 

There  was  not  improbably  a  new  tendency  shown  here,  as 
Renan  insists,*  springing  not  directly  from  Christianity,  but  by 
a  reaction  from  the  shocking  and  savage  preceding  cruelties.  I 
t*hink  such  a  tendency  does  appear;  having  source  in  part  in  the 
Stoical  ethics,  and  preparing  the  way  for  the  Gospel  to  tread,  as 
opening  men's  hearts,  in  a  measure  at  least,  to  its  superlative 
lessons  and  force.  But  it  seems  to  me  almost  as  indisputable 
as  is  the  indebtedness  of  the  city  around  us  to  commerce  for  its 
growth,  that  to  the  new  Christian  atmosphere,  ever  more  widely 
although  impalpably  diffused  through  the  empire,  even  such  late 
and  imperfect  recognitions  of  the  rights  of  childhood  must 
be  fairly  in  some  part  ascribed. 


*  Hibbert  Lectures :  London  cd.,  1880,  pp.  23-6. 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  143 

The  Hebrew  Faith,  preceding  Christianity,  and  supplying  the 
base  on  which  its  spires  and  pinnacles  arose,  had  at  least  in- 
volved a  widely  different  view  of  childhood  from  that  which 
prevailed  outside  of  Palestine.  It  had  given  great  authority  to 
the  father,  but  it  had  imposed  also  strict  obligations ;  while  to 
the  mother  had  been  trusted  an  authority  which  she  nowhere 
else  had  equally  possessed.  While  infanticide  was  common  and 
was  justified  elsewhere,  it  was  no  more  permitted  among  the 
Hebrews  than  was  the  murder  of  the  High-Priest.  The  large 
number  of  children  in  a  household  was  regarded  as  a  token  of 
Divine  favor.  Mothers  nursed  their  own  children,  and  the  day 
of  the  weaning  was  signalized  in  the  family.  The  instruction 
of  children  in  the  history  of  the  nation,  and  in  the  precepts  and 
principles  of  the  Law,  was  early,  solemnly,  and  repeatedly  pre- 
scribed. The  whole  community  guarded  each  child  ;  and  the 
independent  will  of  the  father  was  not  supreme,  under  the  re- 
straining Hebraic  legislation.  If  he  judged  his  son  even  worthy 
of  death,  as  stubborn  and  rebellious,  gluttonous  and  a  drunkard, 
the  mother  must  agree  with  him,  and  together  they  must  bring 
him  before  the  whole  city,  for  lawful  punishment.  The  pros- 
perity of  the  city  was  then  only  conceived  as  perfect,  when, 
with  old  men  and  old  women  dwelling  in  it,  it  should  also  '  be 
full  of  boys  and  girls  playing  in  the  streets  thereof.'  *  The 
hope  and  prayer  of  the  devout  was,  that  *  their  sons  might  be  as 
plants  gi'own  up  in  their  youth,  and  their  daughters  as  corner- 
stones, polished  after  the  similitude  of  a  palace.'  f 

It  was  only  natural,  under  such  a  religion,  that  children  should 
be  accounted  the  heritage  of  the  Lord  ;  that  for  them,  at  differ- 
ent stages  of  their  growth,  the  language  should  furnish  many 
general  names,  of  a  tender  signiiicance ;  that  they  should  be 
presented  with  thank-offerings  in  the  temple  ;  that  it  should  be 
affirmed  of  even  the  son  of  the  concubine  that  God  had  *  heard 
the  voice  of  the  lad ';  %  that  some  of  the  most  touching  and 
memorable  passages  in  Hebrew  literature  should  be  those  re- 
counting the  gi'ief  of  parents  when  the  infant  of  days  had  died  ; 
and  that  the  sweetest  and  grandest  thought,  one  may  almost  say 


*  Zecbariab  viii.  4,  5.  f  Psalm  cxliv.  13.  \  Genesis  xxi.  17. 


144:      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN 

which  prophecy  itself  ever  delivered,  was  that  which  came  from 
the  siiblimest  of  Hebrew  seers,  that  the  fierce  and  warring  ele- 
ments on  earth  shall  be  subdued  in  the  reign  of  the  Messiah^ 
that  the  wolf  and  the  lamb  shall  dwell  together,  and  the  leopard 
with  the  kid,  and  that  '  a  little  child  shall  lead  them.'"^  That 
word  is  like  the  point  of  light  in  the  eye  of  a  portrait,  illumi 
nating  the  scheme  of  the  prophetic  economy. 

Even  the  preparatory  Hebrew  system  is  thus  plainly  distin- 
guished from  the  state  regulations  and  the  social  economies  pre- 
vailing around  it.  But  Christianity  surpassed  it,  here  at  least,  as 
the  light  of  the  sun  the  pale  lustre  of  moonbeams.  Transcend- 
ent in  its  doctrine,  searching  in  its  law,  robust  and  masculine  in 
all  its  development,  never  sentimental  and  never  effeminate,  it 
yet  came  to  the  docile  tenderaess  of  childhood  as  a  priest  to 
consecrate,  as  a  king  to  enthrone  it.  It  made  at  any  rate  spaces 
of  quietness  amid  the  tumultuous  commotions  of  the  world,  in 
which  infancy  should  be  sheltered,  and  its  mysterious  glory  be  felt. 
It  was  when  they  who  believed  in  the  Lord  not  only  saw  in  each  hu- 
man soul  an  appropriate  object  for  his  Divine  mission,  but  looked 
back  with  venerating  wonder  to  his  obscure  cradle — when  they 
imagined,  whether  justly  or  not,  that  angels  had  sung  above  his^ 
birth,  and  had  made  this  the  sign  of  the  world's  redemption, 
when  they  conceived  that  kings  had  come  from  out  the  dim  and 
distant  East,  rich  in  gold,  aromatic  with  spices,  bringing  to  him  on 
his  mother's  breast  frankincense  and  treasure — it  was  then  that 
the  sense  of  the  sacred ness  of  Infancy  took  its  secure  possession  of 
the  world.  For  childhood,  at  least,  the  new  age  dawned  when 
he  whom  men  thought  a  celestial  Person  came,  according  to 
their  apprehension,  from  the  heavens  to  the  earth,  not  in  the 
fulness  of  power  and  supremacy,  but  amid  the  very  humblest 
conditions  which  ever  invest  a  human  birth.  As  the  light  from  the 
babe,  in  Correggio's  Holy  INTight,  illuminates  all  surrounding  fig- 
ures, so  the  light  of  that  birth  shed  an  unfading  lustre  on  the  minds 
of  the  disciples.  To  them  it  was  only  natural  that  afterward,  in 
the  perfect  fulness  of  his  energy  and  wisdom,  the  Lord  should 
take  children  from  the  street  in  his  arms,  and  lay  his  hands  on. 


♦  Jsaiah  xi.  6. 


IN  Politics  and  society.  145 

them  in  supreme  benediction ;  that  he  should  saj,  "  of  such  is 
the  kingdom  of  Heaven";*  that  he  should  announce  that  their 
angels  do  always  behold  the  face  of  Him  before  whom  the  sera- 
phim bow  ;f  that  he  should  declare,  in  words  whose  echo  never 
ceases  in  the  world,  ''  Whoso  shall  receive  one  such  little  child 
m  my  name,  receiveth  me !  "J 

That  was,  for  the  world,  the  coronation  of  childhood ;  and 
from  that  time  not  only  the  cruel  abandonment  of  it  by  parents  has 
been  made  impossible,  but  the  shelter  of  its  weakness,  the  culture 
of  its  delicate  but  prophesying  power,  have  been  chief  ends  in 
all  the  societies  into  which  the  inspiration  of  Jesus  has  entered. 
If  we  find  no  special  texts  in  the  New  Testament  explicitly 
commanding  the  baptism  of  infants,  this  only  makes  more  sig- 
nificant the  fact  that  such  an  ordinance,  however  diflicult  to  be 
reconciled  at  first  sight  with  the  evangelical  requirement  of  faith 
before  baptism,  sprang  up  in  the  church  at  a  time  very  early, 
and  found  itself  at  home  in  the  welcoming  spiritual  consciousness 
of  believers.  Even  infant  communion  came  in  among  customs 
of  almost  immemorial  ancientness,  was  approved  by  eminent  Fa- 
thers and  Pontiffs,  and  lingered  in  places  in  Western  Europe  till 
the  Council  of  Trent.  It  is  still  maintained,  with  original  vigor, 
in  Oriental  communions. 

The  same  strong  current  of  governing  influence  which  thus 
was  revealed  breaking  into  history  has  flowed  on  in  it  ever  since, 
and  it  is  not  needful  that  I  even  remind  you  how  richly  it  is 
manifest  in  the  Christendom  of  to-day.  The  assiduous  and  af- 
fectionate training  of  children — it  may  not  be  always  accom- 
plished as  it  should  be,  but  it  certainly  is  honored  as  a  primary 
duty,  not  of  the  household  or  church  alone,  but  of  the  state.  The 
protection  of  the  child  is  as  general  and  careful  as  of  the  adult ; 
and  no  infant  can  suffer  disastrous  injury,  by  permission  of  the 
law,  even  though  it  be  inflicted  by  the  parent.  The  wrong  is 
avenged,  and  the  babe  is  protected.  Kot  merely  to  the  children 
of  cultured  households  does  such  watchfulness  extend,  but  to  the 
destitute  and  the  orphaned.  Institutions  of  beneficence,  for  their 
shelter  and  nurture,  such  as  had  not  been  known  in  the  world 


♦  Matthew  xix.  14.        t  Matthew  xviii.  10.        J  Matthew  xyiii.  5. 
10 


146     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'h  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

till  the  power  of  Christianity  began  to  be  felt,  are  now  commouf 
in  the  countries  which  Christianity  has  blessed;  while  the 
Church,  inspired  by  the  words  and  by  the  action  of  him  whonj- 
it  accepts  as  Master,  regulates  its  worship,  constructs  its  build* 
ings,  invents  or  applies  new  forms  of  art,  creates  a  new  litera- 
ture, to  minister  to  children.  The  ancient  prophecy  is  fulfilled. 
The  little  child  does  lead  the  household,  and  lead  the  state. 
The  deepest  fountains  of  affection  are  unsealed  with  its  advent 
in  the  household.  The  first  faint  cry,  laden  with  the  ever-new 
mystery  of  life,  seems  a  voice  appealing  from  the  Eternities,  as- 
it  breaks  into  time.  And  the  subsequent  solicitude  of  the  state- 
for  its  future  citizen  is  not  wholly  from  motives  of  expediency. 
The  parental  love  in  those  who  form  and  who  govern  the  state- 
inspires  here  its  administration.  The  one  consecrating  spiritual 
function  which  secular  commonwealths  still  retain,  after  severing' 
themselves  from  every  office  of  religious  instruction — that  which' 
more  than  all  else  gives  them  moral  elevation,  and  a  charm  for 
the  heart — is  this  of  securing  to  all  children  within  them  the  in- 
struction of  knowledge,  and  a  quick  communication  with  the 
best  and  largest  thought  of  the  world. 

If  no  other  change  had  followed  the  coming  of  the  religion  of 
Jesus,  this  change  in  the  attitude  of  civilized  society,  with  it* 
multiplied  instruments,  its  vaster  enterprises,  its  prouder  hopes, 
and  its  bolder  ambitions,  toward  the  weakness  of  childhood,  i& 
surely  one  to  impress  and  delight  us.  It  seems  to  me  to  repeat 
the  example  of  the  Master  himself,  and  to  bring  the  Christen- 
dom which  now  honors,  blesses,  and  consecrates  that  childhood, 
nearer  to  him  than  all  cathedrals  ever  builded  ! 

But  go  yet  further  in  the  same  line,  and  observe  the  equiv- 
alent change  which  has  occurred,  where  this  religion  has  got 
itself  established,  in  the  place  and  the  i-elation  of  Woman  iit 
the  world :  the  added  protection,  the  enlarged  opportunity, 
now  given  to  her — and  given  by  laws  hitherto  made  exclusively^ 
by  men. 

Under  the  preparatory  Hebrew  system  the  position  of  woman 
was  relatively  high,  as  compared  with  that  assigned  to  her  in  ad- 
jacent  nations.  She  had  larger  liberty  than  even  now  is  allowed 
her  in  Oriental  countries,  with  greater  variety  and  importancoj 


m  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  147 

of  employments.  She  headed,  like  Miriam,  the  bands  of  women 
who  celebrated  with  triumphant  song  the  overthrow  of  enemies. 
She  led  armies,  like  Deborah,  and  was  like  her  a  prophetess  and 
a  judge.  In  the  free  grace  of  an  unconfined  maidenhood  she 
went  out  to  meet  her  conquering  father,  with  timbrels  and 
dances.  Her  hymns  were  included  in  sacred  records,  as  was. 
the  song  of  Samuel's  mother.  She  was  consulted,  like  Huldah, 
by  high-priest  and  king.  And  while  the  effect  of  polygamy  was 
disastrous,  so  far  as  that  obtained  before  the  captivity,  and  while 
it  is  obvious  that  the  husband,  not  the  wife,  w^as  the  acknowl- 
edged head  of  the  household,  in  independence  of  whom  the  wife 
could  enter  on  no  engagements,  the  dowry  was  given  for  the 
w^ife,  not  with  her;  the  modern  harem  was  unknown;  the  ma- 
tron walked  abroad  unveiled  ;  her  husband's  house  was  esteemed 
her  'rest';  she  had  a  large  authority  in  the  family,  and  the 
grace  and  force  of  her  character  and  mind  were  honored,  cult- 
ured, and  allowed  opportunity.  Many  references  to  the  gra- 
cious power  and  charm  of  womanhood  occur  familiarly  in  the 
Hebrew  Scriptures,  especially  in  that  section  of  them  which  in- 
coi-porates  the  ethical  wisdom  of  the  time ;  and  hardly  a  nobler 
or  lovelier  description  of  the  wise  matron  has  been  contained  in 
any  literature  than  that  which  is  found  in  the  poem  added  to 
the  monitory  words  of  the  mother  of  Lemuel — which  might 
have  been  designed  as  a  just  and  animated  verbal  picture  of  that 
sovereign  woman,  whom  some  have  sought  to  identify  with 
Bathsheba. 

But  still,  under  the  Hebrew  system,  in  its  relation  to  the  true 
place  of  woman  in  society,  we  have  to  recognize  what  in  gen- 
eral  describes  it :  a  partial  light,  positive  and  prophetic,  but  not 
complete;  as  much,  perhaps,  as  man  could  yet  bear  of  restraint 
upon  his  spirit,  but  by  no  means  a  final  and  true  consummation. 
But  when  we  turn  to  the  other  peoples,  synchronizing  in  their 
liistory  with  the  Hebrews,  into  which  also  Christianity  came, 
we  see  at  once  the  relative  dignity,  as  concerning  this  point,  of 
the  Palestinian  code  and  custom,  and  are  able  to  measure,  yet  more 
distinctly,  the  immediate  and  the  enormous  advance  which  the 
new  religion  everywhere  enforced. 

In  Greece,  remember,  when  its  literature  was  most  elaborate 


1^8    THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

and  engaging,  when  its  art  had  reached  its  superb  consammation 
in  the  most  renowned  temples  of  time,  and  when  its  general 
civilization  excited  the  emulation  or  provoked  the  despair  of 
other  peoples,  women  were  excluded  not  only  from  public  affairs, 
but  from  the  education  provided  for  men.  The  greatest  of 
Hellenic  philosophers  represented  the  state  as  radically  disor- 
ganized in  which  wives  should  claim  to  be  equals  of  their  hus- 
bands. Aristotle  regarded  them  as  beings  of  a  certain  inter- 
mediate order  between  freemen  and  slaves.  Plato  suggested  a 
community  of  wives,  on  the  ground  that  children  so  brought 
into  life  would  be  more  wholly  devoted  to  the  state.  It  was 
only  the  women  recognized  as  unchaste  who  were  permitted  to 
frequent  public  lectures,  and  to  be  on  terms  of  equal  association 
with  artists  and  scholars.  A  daughter  at  Athens  legally  inher- 
ited nothing  from  her  father.  She  lived,  until  marriage,  without 
any  systematic  or  general  training,  in  the  strictest  seclusion ;  and 
after  mariiage  she  could  on  her  own  account  conclude  no  bar- 
gain, and  be  a  party  to  no  important  transaction.  So  far  was 
the  distrust  of  her  carried,  that  even  what  a  man  did,  through 
the  advice  or  at  the  request  of  a  woman,  was  treated  by  the  law 
as  of  no  effect.  At  Syracuse,  according  to  Athenaeus,  who  cites 
Phy  larch  as  as  his  authority,  no  free  woman  was  allowed  to  go 
out  after  sunset,  unless  for  adultery;  nor  even  by  day,  except  as 
attended  by  a  female  servant.*  The  woman  was  regarded  as 
always  a  minor,  and  never  free.  Her  glory  was,  as  Pericles  said, 
that  no  one  should  speak  of  her.  Plato's  statement  is  express, 
that  '  a  woman's  virtue  is  to  order  her  house,  to  keep  what  is 
indoors,  and  to  obey  her  husband.'f 

It  had  been  a  maxim,  long  before,  in  the  laws  of  Menu,  that 
a  woman  ought  never  to  govern  herself,  according  to  her  will. 
No  sacrifice  was  allowed  to  her,  apart  from  her  husband,  and  no 
rites  of  religion.  It  was  declared,  with  a  mandate  of  absolute 
authority,  that  *  a  woman  is  never  fit  for  independence.'  This 
was  not  an  Indian  tradition,  by  which  western  countries  were  ini- 
palpably  influenced.  It  represents,  no  doubt,  the  original  norm 
of  the  Aryan  household.     It  was  not,  indeed,  peculiar  to  that 


DeipnosophistsB :  xii.  20.  t  *'Meno '' :  71. 


m  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  149= 

ConfiiciuSj  with  all  his  excellent  ethics,  recognizes  no  sanctity 
in  the  marriage-bond.  As  a  mother,  woman  was  invested  by 
him  with  special  dignity,  on  account  of  her  relation  to  her  sons. 
Aside  from  this,  her  highest  duty  was  servile  submission.  As 
one  of  the  Chinese  sages  said :  '  Men,  being  firm  by  nature,  are 
virtuous;  and  women,  being  soft,  are  useful.'*  It  is  a  curious 
statement,  cited  by  Schlegel  from  R^musat,  that  the  Chinese  char- 
acter to  represent  woman,  if  doubled,  means  strife;  if  tripled, 
immorality. 

The  Roman  temper  and  rule  about  women  were  marked  by 
substantially  an  equivalent  tone,  though  instances  were  certainly 
more  numerous  there  of  those  who  rose,  while  retaining  their 
virtue,  and  in  spite  of  their  sex,  to  distinguished  position.  But 
Metellus,  the  Roman  Censor,  equally  honored  in  private  and  in 
public  life,  energetically  declared,  in  a  public  oration,  that  if 
nature  had  allowed  man  to  exist  without  woman,  he  would  have 
been  spared  a  troublesome  companion,  and  that  marriage  could 
only  be  recommended  as  a  sacrifice  of  pleasure  to  public  duty. 
Cato  the  Censor,  of  rougher  nature,  was  only  more  vehement  in 
the  same  declaration.  The  spirit  manifested  by  such  distinguished 
and  typical  Romans  entered  into  the  permanent  system  of  the 
State.  It  was  a  fundamental  conception  of  the  law  at  Rome, 
no  less  than  it  had  been  in  India,  that  a  woman  should  never  be 
independent.  As  a  daughter  she  was  subject,  until  married,  to 
ih.Q  patria  potestas  of  her  father.  If  remaining  unmarried  after 
his  death,  she  was  equally  subject  to  the  same  power  in  the  suc- 
ceeding male  head  of  the  household.  As  a  wife,  if  married  ac- 
cording to  either  of  the  ancient  ceremonies,  she  came  under  the 
control,  in  manu^  of  her  husband,  and  was  legally  regarded  as  his 
daughter,  the  sister  of  her  own  children.  Her  property  became 
the  husband's ;  her  consent  was  not  necessary  to  the  marriage  of 
her  daughters  ;  the  husband  had  at  least  a  qualified  power  over 
her  life,  for  even  petty  offences ;  she  could  not,  after  his  death, 
bo  the  legal  guardian  of  her  own  infant  children.  By  the 
famous  Yoconian  Law,  which  Cato  the  elder  had  successfully 
advocated  more  than  two  hundred  years  befcre  the  voice  of 


*  Quoted  by  Douglas  :  "  Confucianism,  etc.":  London  ed.,  1879,  p.  128. 


150     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

Christianity  was  heard  in  Rome,  and  which,  in  its  important 
provisions,  continued  in  operation  in  the  time  of  Gains,  nearly 
a  century  after  St.  Paul  had  there  been  beheaded — no  citizen  en 
rolled  in  the  census,  of  even  moderate  wealth  ($5,000)  could 
make  a  woman  his  heir,  however  he  might  desire  it ;  not  if  she 
were  his  only  daughter.  The  right  to  select  a  female  heir  was 
reserved  exclusively  for  vestal  virgins.  Nor  could  any  man,  en- 
rolled or  not,  leave  more  than  one-half  of  his  property  to  a 
woman. 

Habitual  and  contemptuous  distrust  of  the  sex  was  in  the  very 
life  of  the  governing  classes.  It  ruled  custom,  shaped  statutes, 
and  entered  with  depraving  and  dominating  force  the  highest 
minds.  Seneca  wrote  with  passionate  outbreaks  against  the 
women  of  his  time,  though  he  is  almost  singular  among  phi- 
losophers of  the  more  refined  class  for  speaking  with  affection 
and  honor  of  his  mother.  One  would  not  know  from  any  allu- 
sion in  the  manifold  and  elaborate  writings  of  Cicero  that  he 
ever  had  had  one.  Pliny  speaks  in  his  letters,  with  urbane  com- 
placency, of  the  excellence  of  his  wife ;  but  it  seems  to  have 
been  largely  because  she  gratified  his  vanity  by  admiring  both 
his  writings  and  himself,  and  singing  his  verses  to  the  cithern  ; 
and  he  applauds  the  example  of  a  friend  who  had  celebrated  the 
funeral  of  his  wife  with  a  fight  of  gladiators,  only  regretting  that 
the  African  panthers  intended  for  the  occasion  had  been  delayed 
by  stormy  weather. 

What  fearful  decay  of  all  that  is  noble,  all  that  is  pure,  in 
womanly  character,  came  as  the  fruit  of  this  attitude  of  society 
toward  the  delicate  sex,  I  need  scarcely  remind  you.  Plato 
must  have  done  but  scanty  justice  to  the  better  class  among 
Greek  women  when  he  spoke  of  them  in  the  "  Laws  "  as  prone 
to  secrecy  and  stealth,  and  accustomed  to  creep  into  dark  places ; 
but  he  was  certainly  right  in  suggesting  that  if  they  should  gen- 
erally resist  legislation  they  would  be  too  much  for  the  legis- 
lator.* In  revolt  against  the  system  so  harshly  oppressive 
toward  Roman  women,  because  founded  on  a  conception  of  their 
nature  so  false  and  debased,  there  came  into  use  a  form  of  free 


♦VL:781. 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  151 

marriage,  in  which  the  wife  retained  relationship  to  her  kindred 
and  control  of  her  property,  and  under  which  either  she  or  the 
husband  could  perfect  a  divorce  by  giving  to  the  other  a  written 
declaration  of  a  wish  to  that  effect.  Concubinage,  too,  became 
customary,  familiar,  and  was  legalized  by  Augustus.  The  tend- 
ency  to  moral  laxity,  starting  in  such  a  natural  reaction  against 
the  offensive  and  tyrannical  strictness  of  previous  rules,  went 
swiftly  forward,  till  at  lagt  the  wrongs  which  had  for  ages  been 
inflicted  on  woman  in  civilized  Europe  were  terribly  avenged  in 
the  downfall  of  the  empire  before  those  fl.erce  Germanic  hosts 
who  had  associated  their  women  most  closely  with  themselves, 
both  in  toil  and  in  battle,  and  to  the  stern  chastity  of  whose 
daughters  and  wives  even  Tacitus,  sad  and  cynical  as  he  was, 
pays  honorable  tribute. 

But  what  it  concerns  us  now  to  observe  is  that  just  so  soon, 
and  just  so  far,  as  Christianity  gained  its  place  in  the  empire, 
the  position  of  woman,  social  and  legal,  instantaneously  improved  ; 
and  that  this  was  the  effect  of  direct,  immediate,  constant  pres- 
sure, from  the  religion  brought  by  Jesus. 

The  Lord  himself,  whom  the  early  disciples  regarded  certainly 
as  a  transcendent  Person,  had  been  born  of  a  woman ;  and  the 
fact  was  recited,  to  her  praise  as  to  his,  in  the  jubilant  ecumeni- 
cal creeds  of  the  Church.  "Women  had  been  his  devoted  dis- 
ciples,  during  his  personal  ministry  on  earth  :  the  wife  of  Chuza. 
the  sisters  at  Bethany,  the  woman  who  because  she  loved  much 
had  been  bidden  by  him  to  go  into  peace.  Women  had  been 
the  first  converts  in  Europe:  Lydia  at  Philippi,  the  honorable 
women  at  Thessalonica,  the  woman  named  Damaris — another 
Athenian  Magdalen  she  may  have  been — upon  Mars'  Hill,  the 
Priscilla  whose  name  is  more  than  once  placed  before  her  huS* 
band's,  as  if  to  indicate  a  certain  conceded  and  beautiful  leader- 
ship in  her  genius  and  spirit.  As  soon  as  congregations  of 
Christian  disciples  began  to  be  formed,  in  any  proud  and  disso- 
lute city,  women  began  to  be  recognized  and  effective  in  defi- 
nite and  important  ministerial  functions.  Salutations  were  ad- 
dressed to  them,  epistles  even,  by  the  foremost  apostles;  and 
that  faith  which  was  afterward  radiantly  shown  by  their  sisters 
Xn  the  spirit,  in  the  arena  and  at  the  stake,  had  been  discovered 


152    THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MANS  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

rtiid  commended  in  themselves,  before  the  persecuting  frenzi(i«^ 
arose.  The  grandmother  Lois,  the  mother  Eunice,  were  remem- 
bered  by  Paul  in  his  prison  at  Kome,  when  his  chained  hand 
could  not  trace  his  own  words.  The  whole  Church,  to  the 
thought  of  the  disciples,  took  the  form  of  a  Woman,  radiant  and 
crowned,  on  earth  and  in  heaven. 

The  effect  of  all  this  was  immediate  and  immense.  The 
standard  of  character,  and  of  moral  aspiration,  was  rapidly  and 
permanently  lifted  among  women.  Kot  losing  modesty,  only 
finding  it  perfected  in  tlie  love  of  the  Lord,  they  began  to  reveal 
that  intensity  of  faith,  that  reckless  completeness  of  self-conse- 
cration to  noblest  aims,  which  has  been  since  the  glory  of  the  sex. 
This  was  true  of  those  in  the  humbler  class.  From  celestial  in- 
structions, assurances,  hopes,  even  menial  service  took  upon  it 
celestial  gleams;  while  those  of  higher  social  ranks,  like  the 
Bntish  Claudia — supposed  by  many  to  have  been  referred  to  in 
the  epigrams  of  Martial — passed  out  of  enticements  of  luxury 
and  lust  into  a  wholly  new  realm  of  experience.  Monogamy 
was  made  universal  in  the  Church,  and  marriage  became  a  free 
and  solemn  covenant  for  life,  taking  a  character  even  sacramental. 
The  larger  moral  power  won  by  woman,  by  degrees  made  the 
tightest  legal  restrictions  loose  and  elastic ;  till  in  spite  of  the 
stiffest  prejudice  of  ages,  and  the  wild  license  of  a  passionate 
revolt,  the  just  and  rational  liberty  of  the  sex  at  last  came  with 
Christianity  into  the  licentious  and  ambitious  empire  which  had 
fettered  and  debased  it,  and  which  in  the  end  could  find  nothing 
more  meet  to  do  with  woman  than  to  make  her  a  gladiator.  In 
all  the  Lord's  recor<led  dealings  with  the  women  of  his  time,  his 
act  had  been  one  of  liberation.  To  woman,  as  the  disciples  be- 
lieved, he  had  spoken  from  the  cross,  as  on  the  Yia  Dolorosa 
which  led  to  that.  To  her,  as  they  equally  believed,  he  had 
shown  himself  first  after  his  Resurrection.  "Women  had  been 
joined  in  prayer  with  the  apostles  when  from  beneath  the  opened 
heavens  they  returned  to  Jerusalem  fix)m  the  mount  called  Oli- 
vet. And  the  lesson  of  the  position  thus  assigned  to  the  sex  has 
never  since  been  lost  from  the  world. 

It  was  a  natural  exclamation  of  Libanius,  the  brilliant  and  cult- 
ured friend  of  Julian,  and  the  pagan  teacher  of  Basil  and  of 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  153 

Chrysostora,  when  he  saw  the  mothers  and  sisters  of  his  pupils: 
'  What  women  these  Christians  have ' !  In  the  influence  exerted 
by  Emmelia  and  Macrina  on  Basil,  by  Anthusa  on  Chrjsostom, 
by  Nonna  on  Gregory  Nazianzen,  by  the  mothers  of  Jerome  and 
Ambrose  upon  them,  or  by  Monniea  on  Augustine,  is  seen  the 
fruit  of  the  new  position  and  the  new  inspiration  which  Christi- 
anity had  given  to  the  women  who  received  it.  And  the  effect 
was  not  personal,  local,  or  transient,  merely  ;  it  has  been  as  per- 
manent and  as  wide  as  Christendom.  It  was  in  fact  because  of 
this  that  in  the  darkest  times  of  the  Middle  Age,  women,  as 
teachers,  mothers,  abbesses — like  the  mother  of  Bernard,  or  of 
Peter  the  Yenerable,  like  Heloise,  like  Hildegarde — had  secure 
place,  and  eminent  influence.  They  taught  in  great  schools 
when  these  were  established,  as  at  Bologna,  sometimes  veiling 
their  faces  that  the  charm  of  the  utterance  might  not  be  inter- 
cepted by  the  more  vivid  charms  of  eye  and  cheek.  As  peer- 
esses, in  their  own  right,  they  built  churches,  endowed  convents, 
and  made  their  castles  a  refuge  for  the  poor.  As  royal  persons, 
like  Blanche  of  Castille,  they  guided  with  grace  and  administered 
with  wisdom  the  policy  of  kingdoms.  Even  the  fantastic  cus- 
toms of  chivalry,  in  connection  with  the  Christian  position  of 
woman,  have  a  moral  significance;  and  in  all  the  rough  violence 
of  the  times,  and  the  dense  darkness  of  their  skies,  in  the  power 
of  such  a  woman,  for  example,  as  the  Countess  Matilda,  the 
friend  of  Hildebrand,  or  of  the  intrepid  Beatrice,  we  sec  stars 
of  promise  shining  in  the  night.  The  tendency  of  Christianity 
always  has  been,  while  recognizing  the  sex  in  souls,  to  give  to 
womiin  larger  opportunity,  more  effective  control  of  all  instru- 
ments for  w^ork :  to  put  her  side  by  side  with  man  in  front  of 
all  the  great  achievements,  in  letters,  arts,  humanities,  missions, 
as  at  the  majestic  south  portal  of  Strassburg  Cathedral  the  figure 
of  Sabina,  maiden  and  architect,  faces  the  figure  of  Erwin  of 
Steinbach ;  and  though  the  old  traditions  of  law  are  hard  to 
change,  the  entire  movement  of  modern  society  is  toward  the 
pei*fect  enfranchisement  of  the  sex  to  which  the  religion  brought 
by  Jesus  gave  at  the  outset  preeminent  honor. 

It   is   that   religion   which  has   fundamentally   effected   the 
change  :  not  machinery,  nor  commerce,  nor  scientific  philosO' 


151      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

pliy,  but  the  power  behind,  which  glorified  gentleness,  which  con- 
secrated purity,  and  which  showed  the  Church  as  the  Bride  oi 
Christ.  It  is  that  power  which  has  wrought  hitherto,  which  still 
is  working,  toward  the  grand  consummation.  Do  you  say, '  It  haa 
been  a  long  time  coming'?  Understand,  then,  more  fully  how 
settled  and  radical  were  the  customs  of  ages,  which  this  religion 
had  to  overcome  ;  how  strong  is  still  that  instinct  in  man  which 
measures  worth  by  power,  not  grace,  and  which  says  as  of  old, 
*  I  muscnlarly  can  ;  therefore,  morally  I  may ' !  To  conquer,  or 
even  to  curb  that  instinct,  has  snrely  been  no  trifling  thing ; 
and  if  Christianity  had  no  other  jewel  to  place  in  its  crown,  it 
has  certainly  this  :  the  new  respect,  bom  of  its  ministry,  toward 
that  gentler  sex  whose  delicacy  of  structure,  for  ages  its  chain, 
is  now  its  girdle  of  beauty  and  honor  !  It  is  a  fact  significant 
for  the  past,  prophetic  for  the  future,  that  even  as  Dante  meas- 
ured his  successive  ascents  in  Paradise,  not  by  immediate  con- 
sciousness of  movement,  but  by  seeing  an  ever  lovelier  beauty 
in  the  face  of  Beatrice,  so  the  race  now  counts  the  gradual  steps 
of  its  spiritual  progress,  out  of  the  ancient  hea.vy  glooms,  toward 
the  glory  of  the  Christian  millennium,  not  by  mechanisms,  not 
by  cities,  but  by  the  ever  new  grace  and  force  exhibited  by  the 
Woman  who  was  for  ages  either  the  decorated  toy  of  man,  or  his 
despised  and  abject  drudge. 

Still  another  illustration,  equally  suggestive  of  the  benign 
power  exerted  by  Christianity  upon  the  relation  of  man  to  man, 
is  that  which  is  presented  by  the  change  which  has  taken  place, 
under  its  unwasthig  spiritual  energy,  in  the  legal  and  social 
status  of  the  Enslaved  ;  and  perhaps  there  is  nothing  else  which 
more  vigorously  emphasizes  its  beneficent  effect,  or  which  indi- 
cates more  clearly  that  it  came  from  a  mind,  and  had  within  it 
the  energy  of  a  will,  superior  to  man's. 

Of  the  universality  of  slavery  in  the  world  into  which  this 
new  religion  entered,  you  need  not  be  reminded.  In  respect 
to  this,  all  peoples  were  alike :  and  German  and  Egyptian, 
Frank,  Dacian,  and  Hun,  the  sesthetic  Greek  and  the  conquer- 
ing Roman,  even  the  Hebrew,  whose  ancestors  had  been  brought 
out  of  bondage  only  to  become  slave-owners  themselves — all 
were  partakers  in  this  most  attractive,  apparently  most  reward- 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY,  155 

ing,  really  most  destructive  social  system.  Here  and  there  the 
voice  of  poet  or  philosopher  might  suggest  that  it  was  not  ac- 
cording to  nature  that  one  man  should  own  another :  as  Seneca 
■did  in  notable  passages,  and  as  others  had  done  before  him.  They 
might  inculcate,  as  beautifully  as  he  did,  with  some  who  followed 
him,  the  duty  of  humane  treatment  of  slaves.  Even  Aristotle 
had  done  this,  who  yet  found  slavery  an  important  part  of  nat- 
ural law.  And  they  might  in  later  time  make  some  impression 
on  the  liard  legislations :  forbidding  the  master  to  compel  his 
slave  to  light  with  wild  beasts,  protecting  the  slave  against  the 
more  frightful  bodily  mutilations,  enjoining  that  one  who  had 
treated  his  slave  with  what  even  Roman  hardness  reproved  aa 
excessive  severity  should  be  constrained  by  the  magistrate  to 
sell  him.  The  occasional  feeling  of  gratitude,  too,  for  a  devoted 
or  profitable  service,  would  express  itself,  here  and  there,  in  the 
slave's  liberation.  But  the  system  itself,  which  made  some  men 
the  property  of  others,  seemed  as  firmly  rooted  in  human  society 
as  were  the  Apennines  in  the  substance*  of  Italy ;  and  no  more 
emerging  indication  appeared  of  its  removal  from  its  ancient 
and  solid  establishment  on  earth  than  of  the  mountains  being 
melted  by  sunshine,  or  overturned  and  scattered  by  storms. 

Of  the  special  form  of  slavery,  as  it  existed  in  Greece  and  in 
Rome,  v/e  are  well  enough  informed.  It  was  so  vast  and  so 
prominent  an  element  in  the  ancient  civilization  that  its  char- 
acter could  not  have  been  hidden  if  men  had  tried ;  but  they 
did  not  try,  any  more  than  to  hide  headlands  or  seas. 

The  slaves  at  Athens,  for  example,  were  of  the  same  blood 
with  their  masters ;  at  least  not  separated  from  them  by  such 
apparent  differences  of  race  as  separate  the  African  or  the  Mon- 
golian from  the  European.  They  were  captives,  taken  in  war, 
or  poor  persons  who  had  sold  themselves  because  unable  to  gain 
subsistence.  Those  who  could  not  pay  a  public  tax  were  liable 
to  be  sold  for  such  default.  The  children  of  the  poor  were  sold, 
to  buj  food,  or  in  simple  caprice.  Children  exposed  for  death, 
and  rescued,  became  the  slaves  of  those  who  had  found  them  ;  as 
may  have  been  true  in  the  case  of  Epictetus.  Captives  taken 
by  pirates  were  sold ;  and  because  it  furnished  such  multitudes 
of  slaves  to  the  cities  of  Greece,  piracy  was  held  an  honorable 


J56    THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

profession,  tributary  to  public  welfare.  The  very  name  '  ser. 
vus '  was  said  by  some  to  be  derived  from  '  sei*vai"e,'  because  tlia 
prisoners  designed  for  slavery  were  of  course  kept  alive.  Au- 
gustine gives  this  as  the  probable  derivation  in  his  ''  City  of 
God."  Diogenes,  the  cynic,  was  thus  captured  and  sold.  Plato 
himself  is  reported,  you  know,  by  early  authorities,  to  have  been 
sold  in  JEgina,  by  the  elder  Dionysius,  who  had  taken  offence 
at  one  of  his  remarks ;  and  to  have  been  afterward  ransomed  by 
Anniceris.  The  story  is  told  with  various  embellishments,  and 
in  some  of  its  particulars  may  not  be  correct ;  but  the  fact  that 
slaves  skilled  in  music,  poetry,  the  drama,  the  arts,  were  bought 
and  sold,  at  Rome  especially,  and  were  commonly  owned  in  the 
families  of  the  rich,  is  nowise  uncertain.  Physicians,  sculptors, 
were  numerous  in  this  class ;  architects,  painters,  linguists,  ex- 
pert copyists,  were  also  included,  with  distinguished  authors,  as 
^sop,  Terence,  Epictetus,  Phgedon,  and  others.  The  greatest  of 
Greek  philosophers,  therefore,  if  captured  by  pirates,  taken  pris- 
oner in  battle,  or  simply  fettered  by  the  will  of  a  tyrant,  could 
have  pleaded  no  exemption  for  genius  or  culture  from  the  dis- 
mal fate  of  a  life-long  bondage. 

The  number  of  the  slaves  was  something  enormous.  In  At- 
tica it  was  at  one  time  estimated  [309  e.g.]  that  there  were  resi- 
dent in  that  State,  five-sevenths  of  the  size  of  our  Rhode  Island, 
84,000  citizens,  40,000  aliens,  400,000  slaves.  Gibbon,  you  re- 
member, reckons  the  slave-population  of  the  empire  as  under 
Claudius  equal  to  the  free,  or  sixty  millions  each.*  Fabius  is 
said  to  have  brought  30,000  into  the  markets,  as  the  fruit  of  the 
sack  of  Tarentum  ;  and  Paullus  150,000,  after  the  conquest  of 
Epirus.  When  Pindenissus  was  taken  by  Cicero,  the  inhabitants 
were  sold  for  more  than  half  a  million  dollars  of  our  money. 
Athenaeus,  in  the  Deipnosophistse,  refers  to  individual  Roman 
owners  as  having  10,000  and  more  slaves.  At  one  time,  accord- 
ing to  Aristotle,  the  island  of  ^gina  contained  470,000  in 
bondage :  an  island  covering  an  area  of  only  forty-two  square 
miles,  but  having  commercial  relations  and  dependencies.  Cor- 
inth is  said  to  have  had  almost  as  many,  460,000  ;  and  Chios — 


•  The  Decline  and  Fall,''  etc. :  London  ed.,  1848,  Vol.  I.,  p.  56. 


IN  POLITICO  AND  SOCIETY.  157 

known  to  us  as  Scio — according  to  Thuc3^dides,  bad  still  more. 
Only  the  architects  and  masons  belonging  to  Crassus  exceeded  500. 
There  was  a  just  fear  at  Eome  of  measures  which  would  make 
the  slaves  generally  acquainted  with  their  own  numbers ;  and  as 
late  as  the  time  of  Chrysostom,  reference  is  made  by  him  to  the 
fact  that  under  the  reign  of  Arcadius  rich  persons  owned  a  thou- 
sand or  two  thousand  slaves. 

Of  course  the  price  was  commonly  small, — a  good  slave  at 
Athens,  in  the  time  of  Demosthenes,  costing  about  thirty  dol- 
lars of  our  money ;  or  at  Rome,  in  the  time  of  Horace,  about 
ninety  dollars ;  while  a  man  was  purchasable,  in  the  camp  of 
Lucullus,  in  Pontus,  for  less  than  eighty  cents  ;*  and  the  97,000 
Jews  sold  by  Titus  after  the  capture  of  Jenisalem  brought,  prob- 
ably, individually  less  than  Judas  had  received  for  betraying  his 
Master.f 

So  extended,  luxurious,  and  lucrative  was  the  system,  it  had 
existed  from  such  time  immemorial,  it  was  apparently  so  inextrica- 
bly connected  with  the  political  and  social  organization,  that  the 
wisest  thinkers,  the  most  eloquent  champions  of  public  liberty, 
accepted  and  sustained  it.  Plato  doubts  :  only  contending,  in  the 
"  Republic,"  that  Greeks  should  not  be  reduced  to  such  bondage, 
and  in  the  "  Laws  "  finding  that  something  is  radically  wanting  in 
the  soul  of  the  slave.  Xenophon  makes  no  objection  to  it,  but  sug- 
gests that  the  State,  f^r  its  own  profit,  should  buy  and  work  slaves. 
Aristotle  is  perfectly  clear  in  treating  the  subject  in  his  "  Polit- 
ics." Property  is  only,  he  says  in  substance,  an  accumulation  of 
instruments ;  and  a  slave  is  just  a  movable  instrument,  endowed 
with  life,  which,  under  direction,  gives  motion  to  other  in- 
ferior  instruments.  On  account  of  the  differences  in  human 
minds,  he  concludes  that  slavery  is  founded  in  utility  and  in  jus- 
tice. Demosthenes  inherited  slaves  from  his  father ;  while  in 
the  West  they  were  commonly  classed  with  wagons  and  oxen, 
and  it  is  noted  that  Cato  the  Censor — himself  sprung  from  the 
poorer  classes,  regarded  as  a  model  husband  and  father,  and  cer- 
tainly  representing  no  foreign  temper — used  to  flog  his  severely 
when  they  had  failed  to  w^ait  on  him  correctly  ;  he  forbade  them, 


*  Plutarch  ;   "  Lucullus."        t  Josephus  :   "  Wars  of  Jews,"  VI.,  9  .  2,  3 


158     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

even,  to  entertain  any  sentiment  of  piety,  reserving  such  ex« 
clusively  for  himself;  and  he  exposed  them  remorselessly,  in 
old  age,  when  there  was  no  more  possibility  of  selling  them, 
like  old  oxen  or  worthless  sheep,  to  storm  and  starvation. 

Of  the  condition  of  the  slaves,  under  the  hard  and  haughty 
temper  thus  generated  in  masters,  it  is  difficult  to  speak  without 
seeming  extravagant.  Of  the  frightful  atrocities  perpetrated  upon 
the  Spartan  helots,  the  lashings,  mutilations,  and  savage  ambus- 
cades,  I  need  not  remind  you.  Concede  these  as  exceptional 
But  remember  that  in  general,  throughout  the  Greek  cities,  their 
servile  condition  was  marked  in  the  dress,  in  the  cut  of  the  hair, 
in  the  whole  demeanor  demanded  from  them.  They  were  sold 
naked,  in  the  public  slave-markets.  They  were  not  allowed  any 
place  in  the  courts,  and  could  not  defend  themselves  when  mal- 
treated. They  were  liable  to  cruel  and  fatal  tortures,  to  compel 
confession  of  suspected  crime.  They  often  walked  with  fettered 
feet,  to  prevent  their  escape.  They  were  not  unfrequently 
branded  on  the  forehead,  in  punishment  for  slight  offences,  or 
in  angry  caprice : — a  practice  to  which  the  apostle  Paul  refers, 
you  remember,  when  he  speaks  of  himself,  in  his  touching  words 
to  the  Galatians,  as  beariug  in  his  body  the  stigmata  of  Christ.* 
They  were  employed,  of  course,  in  all  harder  and  more  wasting 
forms  of  labor ;  and  though  the  final  penalty  of  death  could  not 
be  legally  inflicted  by  the  master  at  his  ^own  pleasure,  almost 
any  other  form  of  injurious  treatment  was  open  to  him.  I  con- 
ceive the  condition  of  few  classes  of  human  beings  to  have  been 
more  harshly  oppressive  than  theirs :  and  amid  all  that  fascinates 
the  memory  in  the  eloquence,  philosophy,  poetry  of  Greece, 
through  all  the  apparent  brilliance  of  its  history,  the  real  bril- 
liance of  its  splendid  achievements  in  many  arts,  we  shall  hear 
rising,  if  we  listen  aright,  above  Parthenon  and  Erectheinm,  above 
Agora  and  Areiopagus,  the  wailing  undertone  of  the  dreary  and 
hopeless  misery  of  slaves.  The  very  comedies  in  which  they 
were  caricatured,  to  the  thoughtful  reader  have  in  them  an  un- 
speakable pathos. 

But  in  Rome  their  condition  was  still  more  severe.     With  an 


*  Galatians  vi.  17. 


IN  POLITICO  AND  SOCIETY,  159 

awful  prodigality  their  life  was  built  into  the  vast  and  magnifi. 
cent  w^orks,  porticoes,  temples,  aqueducts,  mausoleums,  whose 
enormous  ruins  still  amaze  us.  Great  multitudes  of  them  were 
trained  and  slain  as  gladiators.  Multitudes  more  were  kept  for 
purposes  viler  still.  As  porters,  they  were  chained  like  dogs  to  the 
door-posts.  As  workers  on  farms,  they  labored  not  unfrequently 
under  chains,  and  slept  at  night  in  the  cells  of  the  ergastula,  un- 
der-ground, wet,  filthy,  and  full  of  disease.  No  injury  done  to  a 
slave  was  counted  by  the  law  an  injury  to  him,  but  to  the  master. 
If  done  by  the  master,  no  one  had  suffered.  If  a  master  was 
murdered  in  his  house,  all  the  slaves  connected  with  it  were  lia- 
ble to  be  killed,  and  even  the  freedmen  with  them.  Not  until 
the  time  of  Hadrian  were  attempts  made  to  limit  the  master's  ab- 
solute power  over  his  bondmen.  Yedius  PoUio  might  feed  with 
them  the  lampreys  for  his  table ;  and  when  in  the  presence  of 
Augustus  he  doomed  to  this  fate  an  attractive  boy,  who  had 
simply  slipped  on  the  polished  pavement  while  carrying  in  his 
hand  a  crystal  vase,  it  was  only  the  arbitrary  will  of  the  emperor 
which  saved  the  slave  and  filled  up  the  pond.  Juvenal,  himself 
son  of  a  freed  man,  satirizes  a  Roman  lady  who  would  have  a 
slave  crucified  in  simple  caprice,  and  would  think  it  an  iAsane 
question,  ^if  he  also  were  not  human  '?  For  slaves  the  punish- 
ment of  the  cross  was  reserved  ;  and  one  form  of  crucifixion,  as 
we  learn  from  Seneca,  was  by  impaling.*  There  were  torturers 
by  profession,  whose  business  it  was  to  exercise  upon  them  their 
detestable  craft.  So  cruelly  complete  was  the  power  over  slaves, 
and  so  benumbed  the  general  sensibility,  that  when  the  praetor 
Domitius  had  had  a  slave  crucified  for  killing  a  wild  boar  with 
a  weapon  appropriate  to  freemen,  even  Cicero  only  spoke  of  it 
afterward  as  '  perhaps  appearing  a  harsh  thing.'  And  so  com- 
mon was  it,  according  to  Suetonius,  to  expose  decrepit  and  in- 
valid slaves  on  an  island  in  the  Tiber,  that  there  they  might  die 
without  expense  to  the  master,  that  Claudius  himself,  certainly 
ore  of  the  least  exacting  of  imperial  reformers,  had  by  law  to 
discourage  the  practice. 

This  was  slavery  in   the  European  countries,  civilized  and 


*  Ad  Marciam    onsol. :  XX. 


IGO     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

cultured,  into  which  came  the  new  religion ;  where  forum  and 
palace  faced  each  other ;  where  the  stateliest  temples  united 
with  Porch,  Lyceum,  Academy,  to  give  to  their  sites  perpetual 
renown ;  where  orators  like  Cicero,  moralists  like  Seneca,  com- 
bined to  instruct  and  to  elevate  the  peoples :  while  among  the 
barbarian  tribes  of  the  North,  from  whom  we  have  sprung,  ii 
was  as  common,  and  no  less  cruel. 

Christianity  entered  on  no  superficial  and  obvious  contest  with 
this  ancient,  consolidated,  and  haughty  iniquity,  so  general  in 
the  world,  and  so  intricately  involved  with  the  customs  of  the 
rude,  the  laws  of  the  advanced,  with  barbarian  ferocities,  Gre- 
cian philosophies,  Roman  power.  It  sent  no  formal  challenge  to 
the  system,  to  which  it  was  still  as  fatally  hostile  as  it  was  to 
idolatry.  But  it  smote  it  with  blows  more  destroying  than  of 
arms,  and  caused  it  to  vanish  as  summer  skies  and  melting  cur- 
rents consume  the  glacier,  which  we  call  an  iceberg,  which  has 
drifted  down  from  Arctic  coasts.  The  Sermon  on  the  Mount, 
God's  affectionate  and  watchful  Fatherhood  of  all,  the  brother- 
hood of  disciples,  the  mutual  duty  and  the  common  Immortality 
of  poor  and  rich — these  were  the  forces  before  which  slavery 
inevitably  fell.  Where  philosophies  had  utterly  failed,  and  elo- 
quence had  been  wanting,  and  the  progress  of  arts,  cities,  or 
states,  had  only  clenched  tighter  the  manacles  of  the  bondman, 
he  who  taught  on  the  narrow  Galilee-beach  overwhelmed,  by 
the  mystic  energy  of  his  words,  the  consummate  oppression.  It 
fell  before  him,  as  the  warrior  falls,  more  surely  than  by  bullets, 
by  famine  and  thirst ;  as  the  giant's  strength  fades  in  fatal  at- 
mospheres. *  Not  now  a  slave,  but  above  a  slave,  as  a  brother 
beloved,  so  receive  him ';  it  was  the  voice  not  of  one  apostle 
only,  though  he  were  the  chiefest,  but  of  the  whole  church,  to 
the  master  who  was  himself  in  Christ.  "  The  grace  of  God, 
that  bringeth  salvation,  hath  appeared  to  all  men "  * — before 
that  announcement  slavery  could  not  stand,  any  more  than  flax 
before  shriveling  tires. 

Christianity  sought  to  reform  society  from  within  outward  ; 
by  working  a  true  regeneration  of  spirit,  and  thus  of  laws  and 


*  Titus  ii.  11. 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  161 

social  custom.  It  planted  the  acorn,  and  was  surer  of  the  oali 
than  if  it  had  built  it  in  any  manufactory.  It  sent  the  Spring 
on  the  earth ;  and  left  the  old  ice-fields,  untouched  of  pick,  or 
drill,  or  dynamite,  to  take  care  of  themselves.  But  as  fast  as 
its  power  widened  in  the  world,  slavery  grew  milder,  weaker, 
less  crushing,  narrower  in  its  range  and  more  merciful  in  its 
rule,  until  it  ceased.  This  brief  synopsis  sums  up  in  a  sentence 
the  crowded  records  of  centuries  of  struggle. 

The  incipient  movements  toward  reform  appeared  under  Ha- 
drian and  the  Antonines,  a  century  to  a  century  and  a  half  after 
the  recorded  death  of  Jesus,  when,  as  I  have  said,  the  atmos- 
phere of  society,  however  severe,  was  beginning  to  be  imper- 
ceptibly modified  by  the  new  Faith.  The  master  was  then 
forbidden  to  kill  his  slave  at  his  pleasure,  or  to  sell  him  for  a 
gladiator  without  permission  of  magistrates,  or  for  combats  with 
wild  beasts.  If  a  slave  were  subjected  to  excessive  cruelty,  the 
magistrate,  on  appeal,  could  constrain  his  master  to  part  with  him 
for  a  price.  A  right  of  sanctuary  was  granted  to  him  beside  the 
statue  of  the  Emperor ;  and  the  formalities  of  enfranchisement 
were  made  perceptibly  simpler.  So  far  as  this  it  was  principally, 
no  doubt,  the  direct  or  indirect  influence  of  the  Stoical  philoso- 
phy which  contributed  to  mitigate  the  condition  of  the  slave ; 
though  neither  jurist  nor  philosopher  attempted  to  give  him  his 
full  measure  of  rights,  and  a  ruler  as  thoughtful,  philosophical, 
conscientious,  as  Marcus  Aurelius,  left  the  ancient  legal  posi- 
tion of  the  bondman  substantially  unchanged. 

But  when  that  renowned  Emperor  died,  a.d.  180,  there  was  a 
force  rapidly  extending  throughout  the  empire,  which  he  had 
recognized  only  with  contempt,  and  had  blindly  combated  with 
persecution,  which  was  to  do  in  this  direction  what  he  had  not 
conceived  to  be  possible ;  which  was  to  accelerate,  widen,  mul- 
tiply, all  the  forces  that  had  been  slowly  and  partially  working 
toward  a  future  of  liberty  and  hope  for  the  slave,  and  was  to  add 
to  them  others,  more  powerful,  to  make  that  secure.  This  force 
was  Christianity.  From  the  first,  slaves  were  welcomed  in 
Christian  congregations,  on  a  level  of  equality  with  others.  By 
the  church,  in  the  third  century,  the  liberation  of  slaves  was  put 
on  the  same  level  of  privilege  with  the  rescue  of  martyrs.  Lao* 
11 


162    THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

tantius  portrayed  emancipation  as  a  principal  duty  of  Christian 
righteousness.  Prayers  for  slaves  were  early  inserted  among  the 
solemn  petitions  of  the  Litanies.  The  oblations  of  harsh  mas- 
ters were  refused,  as  bearmg  upon  them  the  odor  of  a  temper 
not  acceptable  to  God.  Bond  and  free  were  on  the  same  foot- 
ing in  the  houses  and  in  the  offices  of  worship.  Gladiatorial 
fights,  as  a  matter  of  course,  were  forborne  and  forbidden  ;  and 
the  royal  worth  of  a  soul  redeemed  unto  God  by  Christ  waa 
joyfully  recognized,  by  prelates  like  Chrysostom,  in  the  poorest 
disciple.  The  laws  of  Constantino,  though  scarcely  consistent 
among  themselves,  helped  on  the  powerful  movement  toward 
freedom ;  manumission  under  him  was  largely  facilitated,  and 
the  practice  of  branding  was  finally  forbidden.  Under  Tlieodo- 
Bius  the  separation  of  families  was  prohibited.  The  laws  of 
Justinian  moved  more  strongly  and  steadily  in  the  interest  of 
humanity.  By  them  emancipation  was  still  further  encouraged. 
Slaves  were  admitted  as  witnesses  in  court,  and  recognized  as 
having  certain  rights  to  be  guarded.  They  were  required  to 
work  but  five  days  in  the  week,  and  had  the  privilege  of  the 
church-festivals.  That  they  were  under  a  higher  law  than  the 
will  of  the  master,  obedience  to  which  law  brought  perfect  free- 
dom, was  eloquently  taught  from  metropolitan  pulpits.  Influential 
teachers  early  and  emphatically  condemned  all  slavery,  and  de- 
clared the  liberation  of  those  in  bondage  the  duty  of  Christians. 
The  Council  of  Orange,  a.d.  Ml,  forbade  the  reducing  of  Chris- 
tians to  bondage.  The  Council  of  E-heims,  a.d.  G25,  prohibited 
Bishops  from  breaking  up  sacred  vessels  excejpt  for  the  redemp- 
tion of  captives.*  Gregory  the  Great  only  expressed  the  grow- 
ing, at  last  the  governing  feeling  of  the  Christendom  which  he 
ruled,  when  he  based  his  own  manumission  of  slaves  on  the 
fact  that  the  Lord  had  come  from  heaven  to  redeem  all  men, 
without  distinction,  from  the  bondage  of  sin. 

Of  course  the  process  was  a  long  one.  Of  course  it  was  arrested 
by  pauses  and  reactions:  especially  when  the  ascetic  spirit  hard* 
ened  men's  sympathies,  and  made  them  almost  indifferent  to 
Buffering,  their  own  or  others' ;  still  more,  when  the  deluge  of 

*  See  Guzot :  "  Hist,  of  Civilization  " :  New  York  ed.,  1882 ;  Yol.  IE. 
pp.  250,  279. 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  163 

noi'thern  hordes,  pouring  in  turbulent  torrents  into  Ital}-,  set 
back  for  a  time  all  Christian  advance;  or,  later,  when  wealth 
and  luxury  in  the  church  rivaled  those  of  the  previous  empire. 
It  is  not  often,  in  this  world,  that  great  ideals  get  realized  in  a 
day.  The  very  cloud  is  slowly  dispersed  ;  and  the  stony  glacier 
has  to  be  dissolved,  an  ounce  at  a  time,  into  the  brook  that  runs 
musically  from  it.  But  the  progress  was  sure,  although  it  war 
slow.  If,  as  has  been  said,  the  water  of  baptism  fell  upon  the 
brow  of  the  poor  *  to  sanctify  its  sweats,'  it  fell  upon  the  slave 
to  loosen  into  liberty  first  the  spint  and  afterward  the  body. 
Before  the  religion  which  streamed  upon  the  world  through  the 
coming  of  Jesus,  as  before  nothing  else  ever  known  on  the  earth 
in  the  form  of  religion,  the  immemorial  system  of  human  bond- 
age at  last  gave  way  all  over  Europe. 

It  had  disappeared  in  Italy  by  the  fifteenth  century ;  in  parts 
of  Germany  before  the  end  of  the  thirteenth ;  and  though  it 
lingered  longer — to  our  shame! — in  our  own  country,  it  must 
be  remembered  that  here  it  seemed  to  many  to  be  justified  on 
the  ground  of  essential  diversities  of  race,  and  of  its  alleged 
tendency  to  civilize,  and  in  the  end  to  chnstianize,  the  imported 
barbarian.  I  do  not  defend,  or  accept  for  myself,  any  such  line 
of  argument ;  but  it  is  by  no  means  to  be  forgotten  that  slavery 
continued  here  as  long  as  it  did  only  because  humane  men,  de- 
siring for  themselves  to  be  faithful  to  Christ,  earnestly  believed 
that  it  was  harmonized  by  what  they  esteemed  its  beneficent 
efiects  with  the  spirit  of  the  law  of  the  Master.  In  spite  of  that, 
the  ever-growing  moral  resistance  which  hated  and  fought  it  at 
last  became  so  general  and  determined  that  when  the  great  op- 
portunity came  it  swept  the  system  from  the  land  as  the  breaking 
of  an  ice-dam  sweeps  timbers  and  trees,  ice-blocks  and  boulders^ 
before  the  sudden  and  terrible  rush  of  the  liberated  waters.  The 
ethics  of  the  New  Testament  then  marched  behind  bayonets. 
The  roll  of  a  thunder  as  awful  as  that  which  spake  from  Sinai 
was  heard  beneath  the  roar  of  artillery ;  and  it  was  the  irresistible 
force  of  Christianity,  which  could  not  be  baffled  and  could  not 
be  bribed,  overruling  politics,  governing  battle,  and  finding  a 
voice  in  the  great  Proclamation,  which  in  our  time  erased  from 
the  statute  book  the  last  vestige  of  Slavery.    The  North  and  the 


164     THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

South  both  suffered  iu  the  struggle,  and  both  alike  see  God  in 
its  issue ! 

It  is  not  needful,  the  time  would  not  permit,  that  I  follow 
further,  with  equal  minuteness,  the  effect  of  Christianity  in  chang- 
ing the  relation  of  human  societies  toward  the  poor,  the  uncult- 
ured, and  the  dependent.  We  are  surrounded,  on  every  hand, 
by  its  illustrations.  But  the  thing  to  be  observed  is,  that  this 
immense  change,  full  of  benefit,  full  of  prophecy,  has  come  by 
virtue  of  the  organic  structure  of  this  religion,  and  not  because 
of  any  side-forces  accidentally  or  occasionally  associated  with  it. 
This  has  wrought  it,  as  the  sun  brings  the  loveliness  of  summer; 
as  the  chemistries  of  nature  elaborate  the  gold,  which  man's  art 
can  only  mimic.  There  had  been  no  suggestion  in  heathenism 
of  right  behavior  between  man  and  man,  as  demanded  by  the 
prevalent  religions.  The  thought  of  Humanity,  as  a  vital  or- 
ganism, each  part  related  to  every  other,  and  all  capable  of  being 
pervaded  by  one  supreme  spirit, — this  was  not  a  thought  of  the 
highest  philosophy,  or  of  the  subtlest  and  most  delicate  song. 
It  came  by  him  who  surpassed  philosophers,  as  far  as  he  surpassed 
the  rigorous  limitations  of  Hebrew  sympathy.  The  local  re- 
ligions had  tended  always  to  isolate  states;  while  individual 
liberties  shrank,  in  each,  in  precise  proportion  to  such  isolation. 
The  individual  existed  for  the  interest  of  the  state ;  and  classes 
thus  inevitably  arose,  with  rights  varying  according  to  their  for- 
tunate fitness  to  serve  it.  So  came  the  great  number  of  the  free 
poor  at  Athens ;  who  might  hear  Demosthenes  from  the  Bema,  or 
see  Pericles  in  the  Pnyx,  but  who  had  no  part  in  public  affairs.  So 
eame  the  almost  unending  struggle  between  plebeians  and  patri- 
cians at  Rome,  with  the  final  practical  disappearance  from  Italy 
of  the  middle  class  of  small  proprietors.  And  so  came  the  senti- 
ment, repeated  by  Plautus  with  brutal  frankness,  that  *a  man  is 
a  wolf  to  another  man  whom  he  does  not  know';  the  more  terri- 
ble maxim  of  one  nobler  than  Plautus — whose  writings  have 
given  to  the  name  of  Plato  a  lustre  which  neither  Propylsea  nor 
Parthenon  could  equally  give  to  that  of  Pericles — that  the  poor 
and  hungrj^,  being  condemned  by  their  appeals  for  assistance, 
should  be  expelled  from  market-place  and  city,  and  '  the  country 
be  cleared  of  that  sort  of  animal.' 


Ijy  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  165 

How  exactly  Christianity  reversed  all  this,  I  need  not  say.  It 
knew  no  distinctions  of  State  or  race,  but  was  utterly  cosmopol- 
itan. It  was  preached  to  the  poor,  and  the  common  people 
heard  it  gladly.  In  this  universality  of  its  address  it  honoied 
each  man  to  whom  it  came.  In  its  presentation  of  its  own  great 
Teacher — whatever  may  be  our  precise  conception  of  his  unique 
and  superlative  person — it  exalted  human  nature,  and  showed  it 
near  and  dear  to  God,  if  it  did  not  put — as  most  of  the  early 
Christians  surely  felt  that  it  did  put — ^Divine  honors  upon  it.  In 
its  exhibition  of  the  final  just  Judgment,  waiting  for  each,  where 
destinies  should  be  determined  according  to  character,  it  made 
every  man  free  in  the  court  of  Heaven,  whether  with  or  with- 
out any  personal  standing  before  human  tribunals.  Upon 
present  benefits  conferred  on  the  poor,  in  the  name  of  the  Mas- 
ter, and  for  his  sake,  the  very  decisions  of  that  tribunal  were 
foreshown  as  depending,  by  him  who  unrolled,  according  to  the 
record,  before  the  appalled  apprehension  of  men  that  tremend- 
ous panorama.  So,  every  way — by  fact  and  precept,  and  lurid 
forewarning,  by  the  cross  and  the  throne,  by  lowly  advent,  and 
astonishing  work,  and  the  most  majestic  Sermon  of  time — the 
new  religion  wrought  through  the  circles  of  human  life,  wher- 
ever it  touched  them,  to  make  the  humblest  an  object  of  solici- 
tude, to  bind  upon  the  haughtiest  a  new  sense  of  obligation ; 
and  when  men  met  '  around  a  table,  not  a  tomb,'  where  all  alike 
were  the  guests  of  one  Lord,  Jew  and  Gentile,  master  and  slave, 
barbarian  and  Greek,  the  lines  which  had  divided  them  wholly 
disappeared,  in  their  common  privilege,  their  common  love,  and 
their  common  expectation. 

With  all  the  energy  of  its  command,  and  with  the  force  of  its 
exuberant  life,  the  new  religion  taught  whoever  became  its  dis- 
ciple his  incessant  personal  responsibility  for  power;  and  so  it 
made  faith  in  the  unseen  Lord  the  most  effective  ethical,  social, 
political  force  ever  known  on  the  earth.  It  required  any  so- 
called  ^  consecration '  to  him  to  be  manifested  toward  those 
with  whose  class  he  had  principally  dwelt  in  the  world,  and  for 
whose  salvation  he  was  declared  to  have  specially  come.  And 
its  influence,  of  necessity,  showed  itself  widely,  and  has  shown 
itself  long.     Even  as  the  springs  in  distant  hills  fling  up  tlie 


166      THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

waters  whicli  have  silently  flowed  from  tlieir  far  fountains  in 
the  gh'ttering  sheaf  which  flashes  in  the  sun  above  garden  or 
park  or  citj  square,  or  in  the  great  reservoirs  from  whose  abun- 
dance populations  are  supplied,  so  these  remote  and  unseen  forces, 
from  Galilee  and  Jewry,  still  break  forth  in  Christendom  into 
more  humane  laws  and  more  just  institutions.  The  secret  of  the 
whole  is  in  the  Christian  law  of  the  obligation  of  man  to  man. 

Stuart  Mill,  in  one  of  his  essays,*  criticises  the  Christian 
scheme  as  dwelling  too  little  on  public  duties  and  public  virtues. 
It  is  characteristic  of  the  school  of  thought  represented  by  him, 
which  expects  sometime  to  regenerate  man  by  improving  his 
conditions,  rather  than  to  improve  his  conditions  by  regenerat- 
ing the  man.  But  I  read  in  face  of  his  critical  words  the  words  of 
St.  Paul — the  manliest,  most  intrepid  and  high-minded  person 
whom  the  age  of  Seneca  presents  to  our  view — "  I  am  debtor, 
both  to  the  Greeks  and  to  the  Barbarians ;  both  to  the  wise  and  to 
the  unwise  ":t  and  there  I  see  not  merely  the  temper  which 
made  that  trained  and  converted  Cilician  a  master-builder  in 
civilization,  but  the  temper  which  afterward  shot  forth  its  mis- 
sions on  every  side,  and  which  enabled  the  early  Fathers,  in  the 
midst  of  the  fearful  oppressions  of  the  empire,  to  see  slavery, 
with  its  pagan  theory  of  two  races,  falling  at  last  before  the  holy 
word  of  Jesus  that  all  men  are  brothers,  as  the  children  of  God. 
No  debtor  to  any  man,  on  any  human  accounting  of  bene- 
fits, was  the  unwearied  and  ardent  apostle.  The  Greek  had 
laughed  at  him ;  the  Barbarian  had  stoned  him ;  the  Koman 
sword  was  shaking  in  its  scabbard,  seeking  his  life.  But  because 
they  were  men,  for  whom  the  religion  which  he  preached  was 
designed,  and  whom  he  knew  it  had  power  to  bless,  he  was  under 
incessant  obligation  to  preach  it,  to  the  most  remote,  the  most 
obscure,  for  whom  the  Master  had  come  from  heaven,  for  whom 
the  great  Immortality  waited. 

Beside  this,  the  splendid  picture  in  the  *  Ethics,'  of  the  mag- 
nanimous man,  becomes  cold  and  hard,  sterile  as  a  marble  statue. 
The  maxims  of  Cicero  upon  the  duties  of  man  to  man,  or  those 
of  Seneca,  are  feeble  beside  it :  wanting  authority,  wanting  fire, 


*  On  "  Liberty  ";  Boston  ed.,  1863,  pp.  95-98.  t  Romans  i.  14. 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  16'i 

and  wanting  above  all  the  unsearchable  energy  of  personal  ex 
ample.  Self-sacrifice  for  another  cannot  be  shown  to  be  a  duty 
of  man,  unless  upon  the  Christian  basis.  It  is  upon  the  law  ol 
moral  obligation  in  this  reh'gion,  not  upon  any  personal  sensibili- 
ties, or  any  dictates  of  scientific  altruism,  that  whatever  has  been 
humane  and  beneficent  in  the  public  life  of  Christendom  has 
rested ;  and  the  history  of  this  is  also  a  promise. 

"We  sharply  object  to  the  vast  Church-establishment  which 
ruled  Europe  for  centuries ;  but  it  is,  at  least,  to  be  remembered 
to  its  honor,  that  obscurity  of  birth,  poverty  of  resources,  weak- 
ness of  frame,  were  not  barners  to  eminence  in  it,  and  that  some 
of  its  chief  prelates  and  princes  came  from  the  classes  from 
which  in  Athens  slaves  were  supplied,  which  in  Rome  were  con- 
tent with  bread  and  the  games.  The  one  English  Pope,  Adrian 
Fourth,  who  held  himself  lord  of  Barbarossa  and  who  fought 
him  with  relentless  severity,  while  he  claimed  to  bestow  the  sov- 
ereignty of  Ireland  on  the  English  monarch,  was  so  ignorant  at 
the  outset  that  the  monks  of  St.  Albans  would  not  receive  him, 
and  he  became  a  servant  in  a  monastery  at  Avignon.  Alexander 
Third,  who  followed  him  in  the  Papacy,  from  an  origin  hardly 
less  humble,  who  conquered  Barbarossa,  and  nearly  laid  England 
under  an  interdict,  subduing  the  stubborn  Henry  Second  and 
forcing  him  to  an  ignominious  penance,  was  the  same  who  asserted 
the  general  principle  that  nature  has  made  no  man  to  be  a  slave, 
and  who  has  been  credited  with  that  scheme  of  universal  libera- 
tion which  Yoltaire  declared  should  make  his  name  dear  to  the 
world. 

It  is  the  same  power  working  with  us,  under  other  polities, 
but  with  a  force  unchanged  and  unwasting,  upon  which  demo- 
cratic institutions  are  based,  with  educational,  philanthropic,  and 
missionary  enterprise.  The  hospitals  for  the  sick,  the  asylums 
for  the  aged,  the  homeless,  and  the  orphan ;  the  consecrated 
ministry  of  skill  and  genius  to  the  blind  and  the  deaf,  as  the 
fruit  of  which  the  blind  become  readers  by  their  fingers,  while 
the  old  miracle  of  the  Lord  seems  ^peated  as  the  dumb  are 
taught  to  articulate ;  the  ministry  to  the  insane  and  the  imbe- 
C'ile,  which  began  among  the  monks  of  German  forests  and  of 
the  Pyi'enees,  and  which  has  been  carried  in  our  time  to  su- 


L68    THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  MAN'S  DUTY  TO  MAN, 

perb  consummation ;  the  ministry  to  even  the  criminal  classes^ 
who  might  seem  severed  by  their  olfences  from  further  claim 
upon  society,  but  for  whom  the  plans  of  prison-reform  are  in- 
cessantly at  work : — all  these  illustrate  the  new  era  introduced 
by  Christianity :  the  new  conception  which  it  brought  and  haa 
taught  of  man's  duty  to  man.  Communism  itself  is  only  the 
refracted  image  of  a  supreme  truth — the  truth  of  the  indebted- 
ness of  the  strong  to  the  weak :  as  that,  however,  is  dimly  dis- 
cerned, by  intoxicated  brains,  through  bloodshot  eyes. 

I  submit  to  you,  then,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen,  that  it  was  a 
novel  and  astonishing  force  which  came  to  the  world  when  Chris- 
tianity first  was  preached.  If  conduct  be,  as  has  been  said,  three- 
quarters  of  human  life,  that  which  has  changed  so  materially  the 
conduct  of  men,  in  great  organized  societies,  has  at  least  enormous 
power  and  value.  It  seemed  wholly  impossible  that  the  frail, 
obscure,  and  scattered  societies  of  the  early  disciples  should  do 
any  such  thing.  Renan  has  said,  not  untruly,  "  at  first  sight  the 
work  of  Jesus  did  not  seem  likely  to  survive;  his  congregation 
appeared  to  have  nothing  before  it  but  to  dissolve  into  anarchy."  * 
But  the  religion  which  was  in  those  societies  not  only  survived, 
it  accomplished  this  change,  showing  itself  as  vast  in  energy,  as  it 
was  certainly  singular  in  beneficence ;  checking  passionate  adverse 
opinion  with  its  breath,  and  trampling  tempestuous  social  waves 
into  a  plain ;  exalting  itself  to  a  moral  supremacy  which  grows 
only  more  illustrious  as  the  centuries  advance.  We  wonder  still, 
in  mute  admiration,  before  some  triumphs  of  ancient  art.  But 
we  certainly  may  say,  without  hesitation,  that  no  marbles  ar 
mosaics  of  the  days  before  Christ  had  ever  such  moral  glory  on 
them  as  has  that  old  and  dim  mosaic  in  the  city  of  Home,  of  the 
thirteenth  century,  which  represents  the  Master  sitting  between 
captives  white,  and  black,  and  liberating  both  ;  f  as  has  that  pic- 
ture before  which  the  world  has  for  centuries  been  pausing, 
radiant,  more  than  with  KaphaePs  genius,  with  the  Divine 
infancy  and  the  holy  motherhood  of  the  Sistine  Madonna. 

The  final  work  of  this  religion  we  do  not  yet  see.     It  will  not 


*  Hibbert  Lectures  :  London  ed.,  1880,  p.  156. 

fOn  the  Cajlian,  near  the  arch  of  Dolabella  and  Silanus, 


IN  POLITICS  AND  SOCIETY.  169 

be  accomplished  till  a  perfect  society,  various  and  complex,  yet 
harmonious  and  free,  is  universal  on  the  earth,  under  the  sov- 
ereign  rule  of  him  who  chose  the  poor  for  his  friends,  and  peas- 
ants for  his  apostles,  who  honored  Woman,  loosened  the  fetters 
of  despair  from  the  Slave,  and  set  the  unfading  celestial  aureole 
on  the  head  of  the  Child.  And  that  ultimate  society — it  will 
not  carry  the  race  back  to  any  primitive  innocence,  with  a  primeval 
simplicity  of  relations;  it  will  accept,  complete,  and  bless  all 
civilization ;  it  will  be  rich  in  lordly  arts,  vocal  in  literatures, 
abundant  in  garnered  wealths  from  the  Past ;  but  it  will  also,  as 
moulded  by  Christ,  be  like  himself — sweet  in  sympathy,  pure  in 
holiness,  vital  with  love ;  a  City,  not  a  Garden,  but  the  City  of 
God,  coming  down  out  of  Heaven,  ^'having  her  light  like  a 
stone  most  precious,  even  like  a  jasper-stone,  clear  as  crystal." 


LECTURE    VI. 


THE  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  DUTIES  OF  NA.TIONS> 
TOWAED  EACH  OTHER. 


LECTUEE   VI. 

Two  things  are  to  be  observed  in  considering  Christianity  in 
connection  with  the  subject  which  confronts  us  this  evening. 
The  first  is,  that  in  its  own  contemplation  it  is  particularly  a  sys-N 
tern  of  religion,  taught  with  reference  to  a  practical  and  specific  ■ 
effect  upon  persons.  The  second  is,  that  its  benefits,  whatever 
they  may  be,  are  designed  to  be  preeminently  moral  and  spiritual, 
rather  than  secular,  social,  or  political.  Its  first  design  is  to  lift 
men  toward  God,  not  to  make  them,  or  the  communities  which 
they  form,  more  prosperous,  energetic,  or  secure  upon  the  earth. 
"Whatever  it  may  accomplish  in  the  latter  direction  is  to  be  looked 
upon  as  done,  not  reluctantly,  but  in  a  secondary  way,  as  inci- 
dental to  the  bestowal  of  higher  good,  even  the  highest,  upon 
the  mind  and  life  of  the  disciple.  It  is  the  spiritual  fitness  of 
individuals  for  fellowship  with  the  Heavenly  Father,  and  for 
the  Immortality  to  come,  which  Christianity  professes  to  promote; 
not  any  general  civilization  of  nations,  except  as  this  may  be 
consequent  on  the  other.  ^ 

Yet  it  is  also  to  be  observed  that  a  powerful  impression  on  the  \ 
public  life  of  organized  states  may  properly  be  looked  for 
through  the  developing  energy  of  the  system,  if  it  have  really  a 
Divine  place  in  the  world's  economy.  To  make  a  man  freer, 
wiser  than  he  was,  more  sensitive  to  the  claims  of  justice  upon 
him,  more  clearly  aware  of  what  is  needful  to  his  ultimate  wel- 
fare, and  only  more  consciously  interested  in  men  because  in 
more  intimate  relationship  to  God — this  is  to  benefit  not  himself 
alone,  but  every  community  which  he  affects ;  and  what  sets  any 
people  forward,  in  the  path  of  righteous  and  wise  advancement, 
in  the  end  must  instruct,  stimulate,  and  assist  others  around  it. 
If  therefore  Christianity  be  a  religion  coming  from  God,  and 
designed  for  the  world,  it  must  have  it  for  its  final  magnificent 

(173) 


174       A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

function  to  benefit  peoples,  as  well  as  pei-sons ;  not  merely  to  se- 
quester from  barbarous  wastes  occasional  gardens,  bright  in  bloom 
and  delightful  in  fragrance,  but  to  re-fashion  continents;  not 
merely  to  instruct  and  purify  households,  but  to  make  the  entire 
race,  in  the  end,  a  household  of  God. 
I       It  must,  of  course,  have  time  conceded,  and  long  periods  of 
I  time,  in  which  to  do  this.    But  it  must  accept  this  sovereign  mis- 
sion.    And  if  it  be  said,  '  That  is  too  vast  a  thing  to  expect  it  to 
accomplish ';.  the  answer  is  immediate :  '  Then  it  must  not  claim, 
in  any  transcendent  or  superlative  sense,  to  be  an  enduring  cos- 
mical  religion,  sent  from  God.'     It  may  charm  many  minds  by 
pleasing  narratives,  or  comfort  individual  hearts  by  animating 
hopes ;  but  it  has  not  the  power  which  a  Divine  Faith  should 
\  have,  and  must  have,  to  conquer,  quicken,  and  regulate  nations. 

That  Christianity  has  done  something  in  this  direction,  and 
that  it  is  vivid  and  rich  with  promise  of  doing  much  more  as  it 
widens  in  the  world,  appears  to  me  almost  as  evident  as  the  bil- 
lowy seas  seen  from  a  headland ;  that  to  it,  as  the  moral  and  in- 
exhaustible source,  is  primarily  due  the  amelioration  which 
already  has  taken  place  in  the  relation  of  nations  to  each  other ; 
and  that  on  it  must  depend  the  further  and  fruitful  changes 
for  which  we  hope.  To  illustrate  this,  in  a  few  particulars, 
though  rapidly,  briefly,  and  with  great  imperfection,  is  my  pur- 
pose this  evening.  Let  us  first  get  the  change  which  has  cer- 
tainly occurred  in  this  direction,  by  an  instance  or  two,  distinctly 
before  us. 

That  armed  combatants,  taken  in  battle,  might  either  be  killed, 
enslaved,  or  sold,  at  the  pleasure  of  the  captor,  was  simply  an 
elementary  rule  in  ancient  war ;  and  by  both  Greek  and  Roman 
usage  the  principal  officers  of  the  hostile  army,  being  captured, 
might  properly  at  once  be  put  to  death :  as  were,  for  example, 
the  Athenian  generals,  captured  at  Syracuse ;  as  was  probably 
Hegulus,  by  the  Carthaginians ;  as  Hannibal  would  have  been, 
— the  most  illustrious  general  of  his  time,  who  had  scattered  the 
Koman  armies  like  chaff,  and  in  the  face  of  icy  precipices  and 
fierce  mountaineers  had  lifted  elephants  over  the  Alps — if  he 
had  not  preferred  to  anticipate  by  poison  the  death  prepared  for 
him  by  the  Eoman  Eepublic.    The  object  of  war,  in  the  sim 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  175 

plicity  of  antique  custom,  was  the  utter  destruction  of  the  inimi- 
cal power.  The  awful  maxim  literally  obtained,  that  the  laws 
of  war  know  no  limitations :  '  Jus  belli  infinitum.'  And  while  in 
practice,  in  wars  in  which  Romans  or  Greeks  were  engaged  ou 
both  sides,  it  was  common  to  give  quarter  if  it  were  asked,  and 
to  allow  subsequent  ransom,  any  degree  of  injury  to  the  enemy 
was  permitted  and  sanctioned  by  the  recognized  rules.  The 
Romans  regarded  their  own  citizens,  captured  by  the  enemy,  as 
losing  thereby  their  status  of  freedom.  All  their  rights  re- 
mained in  abeyance  until  they  had  escaped  from  bondage,  or  had 
been  ransomed.  The  Jus  Postliminii  was  based  on  the  principle 
that  while  the  Roman  citizen  remained  a  captive  of  the  enemy 
he  was  their  slave.  Nor  was  any  duty  violated,  any  right  over- 
borne, if  all  the  captured  and  all  the  wounded  were  despatched 
on  the  field  after  the  engagement :  as  when  the  Romans  were 
slaughtered  at  Cannse,  or  the  Samnites  by  the  Romans  when 
the  latter  retrieved  their  previous  disaster  at  the  Caudiue  forks ; 
as  in  the  terrible  examples  at  Melos  and  Platea ;  as  when  even 
Germanicus  exhorted  his  soldiers  to  prosecute  the  slaughter  till 
the  people  should  be  exterminated  against  whom  they  were 
fighting. 

This  was  in  the  ancient  time.  On  the  other  hand,  one  pass- 
ing through  Europe  in  the  early  summer  of  a.d.  1871,  saw  the 
numerous  railway-trains  in  Germany  and  in  France  crowded 
with  troops  captured  by  the  victorious  armies  which  had  swept 
across  France  from  Forbach  to  Sedan,  and  thence  to  the  famous 
and  fascinating  capital  which  they  had  girt  with  lines  of  steel, 
and  on  which  they  had  poured  destroying  fire  till  they  forced  its 
surrender.  The  troops  thus  captured,  and  now  returning,  had 
been  carefully  tended  in  their  captivity.  They  had  been  treated 
as  friends,  from  the  moment  of  their  surrender ;  had  been  skill- 
fully, patiently,  and  effectively  cared  for,  in  hospitals  and  in 
camps,  cured  of  sickness,  healed  of  wounds,  fed  and  clothed,  and 
ministered  to  by  the  kindness  of  woman  as  well  as  the  trained 
dexterity  of  man ;  and  they  were  now  returning  to  their  homes,  to 
civil  rights  which  had  suffered  no  suspense  in  their  absence,  and 
with  no  bitter  recollections,  with  only  those  gentle  and  suave, 
of  even  the  country  whose  military  foresight,  its  skillful  leader- 


176       A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

Bhip,  and  its  arms  of  precision,  had  broken  in  pieces  their  organ- 
ized strength.  It  had  made  their  enforced  residence  in  it,  if  not 
pleasant,  yet  not  destructive,  or  intolerably  severe.  And  tho 
Emperor  who  had  provoked  the  war,  and  on  whose  head  it 
might  reasonably  be  felt  lay  the  dreadful  responsibility  fo^ 
scores  of  thousands  of  German  lives  as  well  as  of  French  sacri- 
ficed in  it,  when  he  was  caught  in  the  terrible  ring  of  iron 
and  lire  in  the  town  on  the  Meuse,  was  sent  to  be  lodged,  with 
safety  and  honor,  in  a  princely  castle,  which  was  also  a  palace. 

These  are  not  exceptional  facts.  They  are  paralleled  so  of  ten  ^ 
so  usually  indeed,  after  a  war  as  at  present  conducted,  that  they 
have  ceased  to  excite  surprise;  and  whereas  Bajazet,  in  a.d. 
1396,  after  his  victory  at  Nicopolis  over  French  and  Hungarians, 
impelled  by  the  spirit  of  his  religion,  slaughtered  all  save  a  few 
held  for  enormous  ransom  —  killing  mercilessly  the  defence- 
less captives,  till  the  sharpened  scimetar's  edge  was  blunted,  or 
the  arm  was  too  weary  to  wield  the  mace — when  the  chief  sol- 
dier of  Bajazet's  successor,  Osman  Fasha,  surrendered  at  Flevna 
after  terrible  fighting,  he  was  treated  almost  as  a  son  of  the 
Czar ;  was  conducted  in  state  to  his  transient  captivity,  and  sur- 
rounded with  all  attainable  luxury.  Something  or  other  has 
changed  and  relieved  the  aspect  of  war,  even  along  the  banks  of 
the  Danube. 

Take  another  illustration.  Heralds  and  public  legates  have 
always  possessed  special  immunities,  being  reckoned  not  so  much 
inimical  persons,  even  amid  the  stress  of  war,  as  necessary  rep- 
resentatives and  messengers  of  nations,  without  effective  guaran- 
ties for  whose  safety  public  intercourse  must  be  suspended. 
This  lies  level  with  the  commonest  practical  sense  of  men.  It 
takes  no  fine  philosophy  to  discern  it,  and  no  quick  sense  of 
moral  obligation.  From  early  times,  therefore,  the  function  of 
herald  had  had  the  attribute  of  inviolability ;  and  the  sanctions 
of  religion  had  been  invoked  to  support  and  perfect  this. 

Yet  when  the  Fersian  king  sent  to  Spartans  and  Athenians  a 
demand  for  their  submission,  in  the  fifth  century  before  Christ, 
not  only  was  the  demand  rejected,  but  the  heralds  who  had 
brought  it  were  savagely  put  to  death.  And  when,  at  a  later 
day,  Sparta,  then  in  the  presidency  of  Greece,  sent  ambassadors 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  177 

lo  Siisa,  asking  Persian  intervention  to  protect  her  against  the 
hostility  of  Athens,  two  of  these,  being  seized  in  Thrace,  were 
not  even  immediately  killed — for  which  the  excuse  of  a  sudden 
fierce  impulse  might  have  been  pleaded — but  were  taken  to 
Athens,  and  there  deliberately  executed.  Such  instances  are 
not  singular  in  history ;  but  they  are  significant,  as  showing  how 
the  most  advanced  state  of  Pagan  antiquity,  rich  in  arts  and 
preeminent  in  philosophy,  disregarded  even  a  primary  rule,  if 
any  primary  rule  existed,  for  the  intercourse  of  nations,  when 
its  passions  were  aroused  and  its  interests  imperilled.  ^ 

Recall  then  a  suggestive  contrast  with  this  in  our  recent  history. 
On  the  eighth  of  November,  a.d.  1861,  an  American  war- 
steamer  took  from  a  British  merchant- vessel,  in  the  Bahama 
Channel,  two  men  who  had  heM  high  office  in  our  Government, 
who  were  then  in  its  view  simply  private  persons  conspiring 
against  it,  but  who  had  been  sent  by  the  powerful  confederacy  in 
armed  and  active  resistance  to  the  nation,  to  represent  its  cause  at 
the  courts  respectively  of  Great  Britain  and  France.  The  men 
were  taken,  with  their  secretaries.  It  was  in  the  early  and 
threatening  days  of  the  struggle  to  maintain  the  unity  of  the 
nation,  and  to  overthrow  the  tremendous  insurrection  which 
had  risen  against  it.  No  force  was  used  in  capturing  the  envoys, 
other  than  that  which  vras  indispensable  to  remove  them  from 
the  ship.  Their  protest,  written  the  following  day,  was  respect- 
fully received  by  the  captain  of  the  steamer  by  which  and  to 
which  they  had  been  taken.  They  were  conveyed,  with  all  per- 
sonal consideration,  to  the  national  fortress  in  the  harbor  of 
Boston,  for  transient  detention.  Upon  the  subsequent  demand 
of  the  British  Government  that  they  be  surrendered,  they  were 
"cheerfully  liberated,"  upon  the  sole  ground,  as  affirmed  by  our 
Government,  that  the  right  of  capture  had  not  been  exercised 
in  the  manner  properly  prescribed  by  the  controlling  law  of 
nations.  The  excited  nation  was  satisfied  with  the  answer. 
Being  released,  and  placed  again  on  an  English  steamer,  they 
went  their  way,  otherwise  unhindered,  to  do  whatever  mischief 
they  might  to  the  nation  which  had  sheltered,  advanced,  and 
honored  them,  but  which  then  had  reason  to  dread  their  influ- 
ence, and  if  it  lawfully  could,  to  detain  and  to  punish  them. 
12 


178       A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

If  the  example  of  Athens  had  been  recognized,  as  containing 
any  suggestion  of  right,  such  dangerous  plotters  against' nationjj 
life,  wherever  captured,  would  assuredly  have  forfeited  their  life. 
Some  force  or  other  has  wrought  a  change. 

There  is  no  need  to  multiply  illustrations.  An  additional  one, 
recent  and  signal,  compels  our  attention  :  the  tribunal  convened  at 
Geneva,  a.d.  1871-2,  for  investigating  and  adjusting  the  claims 
of  this  country  against  Great  Britain,  on  account  of  the  damage 
done  to  our  commerce  by  rebel  cruisers,  especially  by  the  Alabama, 
a  steamer  built  but  not  equipped  in  British  territory,  whose 
arrest  had  been  ordered  by  the  English  authorities,  on  reasonable 
suspicion,  but  which  had  escaped  from  one  of  their  ports  before 
Buch  orders,  being  late  in  their  issue,  could  be  enforced.  Re- 
membering the  immense  number  of  wars  which  have  broken 
into  frightful  explosion  on  occasions  far  less  irritating  than  this, 
remembering  the  vast  excitements  of  feeling  which  preceded  the 
arbitration,  both  in  this  country  and  in  England,  the  peaceful 
submission  of  such  gigantic  and  intricate  claims,  on  the  part  of 
two  proud  and  powerful  nations,  to  a  tribunal  composed  of  five 
persons,  only  two  of  whom  had  been  directly  named  by  those 
representing  the  interested  nations,  whose  decision  was  reached 
under  formulated  rules  carefully  and  liberally  defining  the  law 
as  understood  between  the  parties — this  must  continue  among 
the  significant  and  memorable  facts  of  modern  diplomacy :  a  ma- 
jestic illustration  of  the  extent  to  which  the  public  law  of 
equity  and  comity  governing  nations  has  come  to  be  recognized 
as  of  sovereign  authority ;  a  most  animating  prophecy  of  the 
power  and  scope  which  it  may  reasonably  be  expected  to  gain  in 
after-time. 

'  Geneva ! ' — it  was  once  said,  when  it  was  proposed  to  hold 
there  a  religious  convocation :  '  why  always  at  Geneva  ?  It  is 
only  a  speck  of  sand  on  the  map  of  Europe ' !  '  Nay,' — was  the 
answer :  '  say  rather  a  speck  of  musk,  which  has  perfumed  the 
Continent ' !  The  fine  pervasive  odor  of  the  action  which  was 
taken  there  in  a.d.  18Y2,  ought  to  fill  with  its  perfume  long  pas- 
gages  of  history. 

That  an  immense  change  has  certainly  occurred  in  the  relation 
of  nations  to  each  other  since  Christianity  was  preached  in  the 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER,  179 

world,  will  not  then  be  disputed.  Bat  the  question  remains — 
and  it  is  for  us,  the  important  question — ^liow  far  has  the  relig- 
ion introduced  to  the  world  by  Jesus  of  E'azareth  contributed 
to  this  change?  Looking  at  the  matter  without  prejudice  in 
either  direction,  can  we  say  that  it  has  been,  in  any  true  sense, 
either  its  parent  or  its  effective  promoter  ? 

That  it  alone  has  wrought  directly  the  remarkable  change, 
without  side-forces,  often  themselves  originating  with  it,  but 
working  in  distinct  though  parallel  lines,  I  should  be  the  last  to 
affirm.  Commerce,  the  arts,  the  rapid  advances  in  popular  edu- 
cation, a  better  social  and  political  spirit — even  a  spirit  which  has 
sometimes  antagonized  Christianity,  as  in  the  French  Encyclo- 
pedistes — all  these  have  had  their  part  in  the  progress,  the  recog- 
nition of  which  must  be  ample  and  hearty.  But  that  the  ener- 
getic and  surprising  religion  whose  effects  in  other  spheres  we 
have  considered  gave  primary  impulse  to  this  movement,  and 
has  ever  since  sustained  and  advanced  it,  appears  to  me  plain : 
almost  too  much  so  to  admit  of  dispute:  and  the  general  con- 
sent of  the  wisest  and  most  learned  of  the  commentators  and 
students  of  the  Law  International  confirms  the  judgment. 

I  have  said  already,  in  the  previous  lecture,  that  in  the  ancient 
thoughtful  and  cultivated  world  the  state  was  recognized  as  of 
an  importance  so  paramount  that  individual  liberty  could  scarcely 
be  maintained,  in  fulness  and  security,  in  connection  with  an 
organism  so  imperative  and  exacting.  The  same  influences 
which  wrought  to  this  effect  wrought  also  to  the  estrangement  of 
one  state  from  another,  and  the  consequent  relative  isolation  of 
each.  The  nations  were  divided  by  their  local  religions,  more 
than  by  any  lack  of  commerce,  or  of  enterprise  in  travelling, 
or  of  a  common  medium  of  language.  There  was  commerce 
enough  between  Tyre  and  the  Ionian  isles,  between  Carthage, 
Alexandria,  Antioch,  and  Home.  But  the  jealous  instinct  for 
self -ad  van  cement  seemed  reinforced  with  religious  sanctions  in 
the  ancient  states,  as  a  duty  due  to  the  local  gods  ;  and  relations 
of  inherited  and  suspicious  aversion,  flaming  easily  into  active 
hoEtility,  were  thus  natural  to  them.  International  Law,  therefore, 
as  representing  the  moral  and  jural  relations  of  independent  peo- 
ples, was  simply  impossible,  in  any  organized  development 


180       A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

j  in  that  state  of  society.  The  noble  declaration  of  Burke^ 
that  "  Justice  is  the  common  concern  of  mankind,"  which  a  dis- 
tinguished  English  writer  on  International  Law*  has  made  a 
motto  for  his  volumes — ^represented  a  fact  beyond  the  horizon 
of  ancient  life. 

The  Greek  states,  small  and  contiguous,  speaking  the  same 
language,  having  apparently  common  interests,  having  substan- 
tially a  cominon  descent  and  a  common  religion — these  were 
almost  constrained  to  recognize  some  reciprocal  rights,  and  cor- 
relative duties:  the  allowance  of  quarter  to  the  captured,  for  ex- 
ample, and  of  subsequent  ransom  ;  the  sacredness  of  truces,  for 
the  burial  of  the  dead ;  the  security  from  death  of  those  taking 
refuge  in  particular  temples  on  the  capture  of  a  city  ;  the  inex- 
pediency of  erecting  permanent  trophies  after  victory  ;  the  pro- 
priety even,  on  occasion,  of  common  action,  to  resist  invasion, 
or  to  maintain  among  themselves  the  balance  of  power. 

Thus  occasional  Hellenic  confederacies  arose;  and  thus  the 
Amphictyonic  assembly,  which  met  at  Delphi  in  the  spnng,  and 
at  Thermopylae  in  the  autumn,  and  in  which  twelve  of  the  Hel- 
lenic communities  were  represented,  though  originally  consti- 
tuted for  religious  purposes,  to  watch  over  the  interests  of  the 
Delphian  temple,  had  a  covenant  at  the  outset  not  to  destroy  an 
Amphictyonic  town,  or  to  cut  it  off  from  running  water ;  and  it 
afterward,  at  times,  took  cognizance  of  social  and  political  mat- 
ters. It  was  never,  however,  a  federal  Hellenic  congress,  as 
some  have  conceived  it,  as  Cicero  himself  would  seem  to  have 
imagined.  It  had  no  extended  or  permanent  power.  Thucydidea 
makes  no  mention  of  it,  though  the  times  of  which  he  left  his 
unsurpassed  record  preeminently  needed  its  intervention,  if  such 
had  been  possible.  Xenophon  is  equally  silent  concerning  it. 
For  many  generations  the  very  fact  of  its  existence  hardly  ap- 
pears; and  at  length,  when  it  sought  to  assume  more  authority, 
instead  of  contributing  to  unite  and  protect  the  Hellenic  peoples, 
it  became  the  source  of  fierce  and  wasting  sacred  wars,  and  led 
directly  to  the  fatal  battle  of  Cheeroneia,  and  the  supremacy 
over  Greece  of  Philip  of  Macedon. 


♦PhilUmore:   "Comm.  on  Interaational  Law.*' 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  181 

But  while  the  Greek  states  were  so  composed  and  so  located 
as  to  make  intermittent  arrangements  among  them  for  public 
welfare  almost  inevitable,  and  while  one  of  the  lost  books  of  Aris- 
totle is  said  to  have  treated  of  the  rules  of  war,  they  recognized 
no  obligation  whatever  toward  "  Barbarians,"  under  which  clasa 
were  reckoned  all  external  peoples ;  and  the  term  Intemational- 
law  is  not  as  pertinent  to  what  existed  among  themselves  ai? 
w^ould  be  the  name  Inter-state,  or,  to  take  the  phrase  of  Mr. 
Grote,  Inter-political  regulations. 

The  Romans  declared  war  with  elaborate  ceremony,  and  had 
a  college  of  heralds  for  the  purpose,  said  to  have  been  borrowed 
from  the  Etruscans ;  but  they  contemplated  the  subjection  of  the 
world  to  their  own  power,  not  the  peaceful  confederation  of  its 
separated  kingdoms,  and  their  Jus  Gentium  denoted  therefore 
merely  the  common  principles  of  law  observed  by  all  peoples,  in 
distinction  from  the  Jus  Civile,  or  the  Law  peculiar  to  the  people 
of  Rome.  When  the  empire  was  broken  into  separated  divisions, 
occupied  by  populations  part  of  which  had  been,  in  various  meas- 
ure, under  the  dominion  of  Roman  Law,  and  which  came  sub- 
sequently to  be  affected  by  a  common  Christianity — then  was 
presented  the  first  real  opportunity  in  history  for  developing  a 
Law,  marked  by  equity,  common  to  severed  and  distant  king- 
doms, and  regulating  the  relations  of  each  to  the  rest.  To  that 
point,  therefore,  we  always  turn  to  find  the  beginnings  of  what 
has  been  since  a  distinguished  progress.  The  earliest  definition 
of  a  Law  between  nations  has  been  said  to  be  that  of  Isidore  of 
Seville,  in  the  early  part  of  the  seventh  century.* 

It  is  of  course  to  be  recognized  as  true,  what  is  now  and  then 
scornfully  said — sometimes  with  that  superciliousness  of  tone 
which  hardly  impresses  one  as  among  the  graces  of  unbelief — 
that  the  influence  upon  the  customs  of  nations  thus  attributed  to 
Christianity,  and  referred  for  its  incipient  development  to  that 
period  in  history,  was  exceedingly  slow  in  operation  ;  and  that  for 
centuries,  especially  through  what  a  subsequent  fashion  desig- 
nates as  the  *Ages  of  Faith,'  the  effect  which  it  produced  in 
curbing  barbarism,  and  establishing  peoples  in  relations  of  amity 


*  See  Kennedy's  "  Hulsean  Essay  ":  Cambridge  ed.,  1856,  p.  59. 


1S2       A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

was  not  very  perceptible.  Yet  it  is  to  be  observed  that  the  stat© 
rnent  as  thus  made,  without  limitation,  appears  to  be  exaggerated. 
The  reference  of  questions  in  dispute  between  princes  to  councils- 
or  to  the  Pope,  the  combination  of  princes  in  the  Crusades,  these 
with  other  facts  show  tendencies  somewhat  early  and  vigorous 
toward  another  condition  than  that  of  constant  armed  hostility. 
And  it  is  certainly  in  fairness  to  be  remembered  on  what  a  con- 
fused and  unmanageable  mass  of  fierce  and  turbulent  human  life 
— full  of  savage  impulses,  inherited  animosities,  implacable  pas- 
sions, and  the  rudest  superstitions — the  influence  of  the  religion 

/   had  to  be  exerted. 

We  know  nothing  by  experience,  we  hardly  can  picture  to  our- 
selves by  any  effort  of  an  active  imagination,  the  awful  wildnesa 
of  rapacity  and  lust,  the  ignorance  of  any  moral  restraint,  the 
terrific  and  fermenting  ferocity  of  spirit,  amid  which  the  Western 
empire  fell,  and  which  seemed  only  to  become  more  portentous 
when  that  last  centre  of  social  organization  and  of  political  order 
had  been  destroyed.  It  was,  as  Guizot  has  said,  and  others  before 
him,  "  a  veritable  deluge  of  divers  nations,  forced  one  upon  an- 
other, from  Asia  into  Europe,  by  wars  and  migrations  in  mass, 
which  inundated  the  empire,  and  gave  the  decisive  signal  for  its 
fall."  *     The  Western  Germans  and  the  Gauls  had  begun  to  be 

y  lifted,  in  a  degree,  from  their  recent  barbarism.  But  the  hordes 
of  Yandals,  Goths,  Huns,  who  poured  over  western  and  south- 
ern Europe,  forced  with  violence  enormous  elements  of  all  that 
was  most  brutal  and  savage  into  the  countries  which  they  over- 

I  ran,  and  with  whose  peoples  they  were  commingled.     War  was 

I  their  pastime,  murder  their  luxury,  rapine  their  industry.  To 
any  who  had  knowledge  of  better  things,  it  not  unnaturally 
seemed  as  if  the  nether  abysses  had  been  opened,  and  demoniac 
powers  had  assumed  a  swift  and  frightful  supremacy.  In  fact,  it 
was  in  the  sixth  century  that  the  fearful  belief  in  magic  and 
witchcraft,  which  is  general  in  savage  life,  which  paganism  had 
done  little  to  dispel  and  much  to  cultivate,  and  which  Christi- 
anity found  in  the  world  as  one  of  the  worst  legacies  from  the 
Past,  took  fullest  and  strongest  possession  of  men's  minds.     The 


♦Guizot,  "History  of  France":  Boston  ed.,  Vol.L,  p.  133. 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  183 

proximate  and  palpable  diabolism  of  men  seemed  to  image  an 
energetic  and  an  almost  ubiquitous  diabolism  above,  beating  in 
npon  the  earth  from  unseen  spheres.  Satanic  inspirations  appeared 
to  give  the  readiest  account  of  the  fierce  and  pitiless  complex  of 
iniquities  in  which  happiness,  hope,  and  human  life  were  fatally 
immeshed.  When  malignity  and  perfidy  became  so  portentous, 
when  cruelty,  rapacity,  drunkenness,  lust,  came  leaping  out  of 
Hercynian  woods  or  sweeping  in  irresistible  fury  from  Scythian 
wastes,  it  is  not  strange  that  they  should  have  seemed  to  men's 
horrified  hearts  to  have  infernal  energies  behind  them  ;  that  fear 
should  interpret  the  air  itself  as  swarming  with  ministers  of 
fiendish  passion,  and  of  a  more  than  mortal  power.  It  is  not 
strange  that  tlie  shadow  of  that  lurid  and  terrifying  impression 
should  have  lain  for  centuries  on  the  lands  which  then  as  never 
before  it  smote  and  filled. 

The  marvel  is  that  out  of  such  a  horrible  chaos,  of  roaming  ban- 
ditti, devastated  provinces,  sacked  cities,  fighting  nations,  bewil- 
dered minds,  the  modern  Europe  could  be  evolved ;  and  although 
by  the  time  of  Charlemagne  moral  forces,  emanating  from  the 
centres  of  Christian  control,  had  begun  to  operate  on  these  bar- 
baric populations,  after  his  reign  was  over  the  old  chaos  seemed 
reeotablished.  To  recognize  this,  one  has  only  to  remember  that 
at  the  end  of  the  ninth  century  his  extended  empire  had  already 
been  broken  up  into  seven  separated  kingdoms ;  and  that  at  the 
end  of  the  tenth  century  there  were  fifty-five  duchies,  lordships, 
or  other  feudal  fiefs,  each  with  its  proper  and  permanent  sov^- 
ereignty,  established  in  France.  Florus  said,  without  exagger- 
ation, '  The  general  good  is  annulled  ;  each  occupies  himself  with 
his  own  interests ;  God  is  forgotten.'  But  in  spite  of  all  that  s 
was  weak,  ignominious,  and  morally  disgraceful  in  these  centu- 
lies  and  in  those  which  followed,  the  undestroyed  power  of  the 
Christian  religion  continued  to  operate.  The  European  celebrity, 
and  the  unrivalled  influence,  of  a  man.  at  once  so  eloquent  and 
60  saintly  as  Bernard  of  Clairvaux,  show  what  immense  pi-ogres3 
had  been  made  in  his  time.  The  doctrine  which  he  preached 
may  not  in  all  respects  command  our  acceptance,  as  the  true  in- 
terpretation  of  the  Christian  religion.  But  no  one  doubts  that 
it  was  that  religion,  as  he  conceived  and  labored  to  spread  it, 


I8i         A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

which  gave  to  him  his  unsurpassed  power.     It  was  that  religion 
which  at  last  wrought  the  wonder  in  history  of  civilized  states 
emerging  from  the  indescribable  disorder,  of  grossness,  fierce- 
ness, clashing  passions,  and  slaughtering    battle,  of  which  the 
earlier  time  had  been   full.      To  have  done   the  work  which 
Christianity  then  did,  is  one  of  the  grandest  of  its  victories.     To 
imagine  that  any  other  force  known  to  history,  conceivable  by 
man — any  stately  ethics  or  fine  philosophy,   any  military  pru- 
j  dence,  or  sagacious  legislation — could  have  done  it  more  rapidly 
[  could  have  done  it  at  all,  is  simply  to  cut  loose  from  the  teach- 
\  ings  of  experience,  and  to  do  small  honor  to  common-sense. 

Still,  after  the  progress  of  the  Law  International  had  thus 
been  initiated,  it  continued  of  course  for  long  periods  of  time 
to  be  very  slow.  It  was  resisted  by  a  thousand  fierce  forces, 
and  by  establishments  crafty,  capricious,  jealous  of  rivals,  and 
inveterately  attached  to  earlier  traditions.  It  was  of  course 
long  antagonized  by  that  system  of  Feudalism  the  spread  of 
which  I  have  indicated :  whose  tendency  was  to  localize  law,  and 
to  sever  from  each  other  detached  communities,  over  which  the 
several  feudal  superiors  presided  in  almost  unchecked  control. 
In  France,  for  example,  or  in  Germany,  the  nation  was  not  for 
a  long  time  as  distinct  and  self-conscious,  as  compact  in  power, 
as  imperative  in  will,  as  was  the  feudal  district  or  province  ;  and 
it  could  not  be  until  national  existence  became  fully  developed, 
and  expectant  of  permanence,  that  the  respective  rights  and  ob- 
ligations of  such  slowly- organized  incorporeal  Persons  could  be 
defined.  Riparian  rights  can  only  be  settled,  with  the  connected 
easements  and  privileges,  where  rivers  themselves  already  exist, 
with  occupied  banks.  There  can  be  no  settled  law  of  commerce 
till  that  elastic  and  indomitable  interest  has  got  itself  estab- 
lished. The  Hanseatic  League  could  only  exist  because  Ham- 
burg and  Liibeck,  Cologne,  Dantzic,  Brunswick,  and  the  other 
cities  confederated  in  it.  Were  already  populous  and  wealthy,  and 
were  interested  in  common  to  protect  trade  and  to  punish 
I  piracy.  In  the  same  way,  there  could  be,  in  the  nature  of  the 
j  case,  no  Law  for  Nations  till  nations  themselves  had  been 
1  evolved  into  a  definite,  abiding,  and  self-conscious  personality ; 
as  the  English  was,  gradually,  after  the  Norman  conquest ;  aa 
the  French  was,  after  the  time  of  St.  Louis. 


TOWARD  BACH  OTHER.  185 

Even  then  the  overshadowing  Papal  autocracy,  though  in 
various  ways  it  had  prepared  the  way  for  it,  long  delayed  the 
development  of  a  great  voluntary  secular  law,  regulating  the  re- 
lations of  nations  to  each  other ;  and  the  advanced  state  of  moral 
and  of  mental  training,  which  is  an  essential  condition  of  snch 
a  law,  did  not  widely  exist  in  Europe  until  later  centuries.  In-  \ 
ternational  Law,  as  we  term  the  rules  which  regulate  the  inter-/ 
course  of  nations  with  each  other,  is  a  voluntary  thing,  in  a' 
sense  and  measure  in  which  other  laws  are  not.  Within  the 
state  enactments  are  imposed,  by  established  authority,  on  sub- 
jects or  citizens.  But  states  themselves,  according  to  the  pre- 
mise of  this  larger  law,  are  independent  and  self-controlling. 
They  come  under  its  limitations,  if  at  all,  only  by  their  affirma^ 
tive  consent.  The  very  existence  of  it,  therefore,  is  conditioned 
on  the  prevalence  of  just  and  governing  moral  ideas.  It  can  be 
extended  only  as  the  range  of  the  authority  of  these  widens  in  the 
world ;  and  its  ultimate  triumph  is  to  come,  if  ever,  when  such 
controlling  moral  ideas  have  supremacy  among  men.  When 
nations  feel,  if  ever  they  do  feel,  that  they  have  common  moral 
interests  to  consult  and  subserve,  and  that  the  principles  ol 
equity  and  humanity  are  as  binding  on  them  as  on  private  per- 
sons— are,  in  fact,  a  rule  for  them,  coming  from  Him  concern- 
ing whom  Hooker  said  that  'our  safest  eloquence  is  our  silence,' 
and  of  whose  rule  he  also  said  that  '  no  less  can  be  acknowl- 
edged than  that  her  seat  is  the  bosom  of  God,  and  her  voice  the 
harmony  of  the  world '  * — when  this  is  practically  acknowU 
edged  and  seriously  felt,  then  will  the  reign  of  this  modern, 
voluntary,  and  sovereign  Law,  which  seeks  strictly  and  justly  to 
govern  nations  in  their  relations  with  each  other,  be  everywhere 
established.  It  can  come  only  as  the  consummate  flower  of  a 
deeply-rooted  and  slowly-maturing  historical  civilization  :  not  / 
sudden,  or  short-lived,  like  the  terminal  bud  of  the  Talipat- 
palm  of  Ceylon,  with  its  fragrant  golden  bloom,  but  like  that 
breaking  from  the  summit  of  a  stem  a  hundred  feet  high,  with 
the  growth  of  many  successive  years  behind  and  beneath  it. 

But  how  is  it  that  Christianity  has  contributed  to  form  or  tc 


*B.  I:  cb.2,  §2-  cli.  16,  §  8. 


186         ^  ^^W  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

advance  this  Law  between  nations?  We  may  see  that  the  ancient 
ethnic  religions  were  of  course  unfriendly  to  it.  We  may  know 
that  the  Koran  actually  forbids  it :  enjoining  its  disciples  to 
contract  no  friendships  with  those  of  another  faith,  coinmand-i 
ing  war  to  the  end  against  infidels,  and  ordering,  when  they 
have  been  overcome,  to  strike  off  their  heads  with  a  great 
slaughter,  and  to  bind  the  remnant  in  bonds.  Bat  has  the  relig- 
ion brought  by  Jesus  shown  positive  power  in  the  opposite 

I  direction  ?  Has  it  influenced  the  Law  to  which  it  may  be  admit- 
ted to  have  given  possibility  ?  Is  there  any  traceable  connection 
between  parables  and  treaties?  between  the  Beatitudes  and 
recent  war-usages  ?  between  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  or  him 
who  preached  it,  and  the  rules  which  make  a  neutral  ship  safe 
from  assault,  or  which  tend  to  substitute  courts  of  arbitration 
for  the  undisceniing  arbitrament  of  battle  ?  The  question  is  a 
just  one;  and  the  answer  to  it  appears  to  me  in  no  degree 
difficult. 

^  Christianity  certainly  presents  no  code,  according  to  which  the 
affairs  of  nations  shall  be  conducted.  Less  than  any  other  relig- 
ion is  it  a  legal  or  rubrical  system,  even  in  relation  to  its  per- 
sonal disciples.  Wherever  it  affects  nations,  it  can  do  so  only 
by  its  principles  and  spirit,  not  by  ecumenical  rules  formulated 
in  it.     But  through  these  principles,  and  by  this  spirit,  it  does 

V affect  peoples,  even  powerfully;  and  its  energy  is  exerted  in 
that  precise  line  of  development  in  which  they  have  now  for 
centuries  been  advancing,  since  the  Western  Empire  broke  apart 
into  separated  states,  and  the  time  came  for  a  new  code  exhibit- 
ing national  duties  and  rights.  A  few  moments'  thought  will 
make  this  apparent. 

As  I  have  said,  in  the  contemplation  of  Christianity  the 
individual  is  confessedly  supreme,  as  the  conscious,  spiritual, 
responsible  person,  to  whom  instructions  and  precepts  are  given, 
for  whom  Divine  provisions  are  arranged,  and   before  whom 

j  opens  the  waiting  Immortality.  By  the  fact  that  it  is  a  religion 
for  persons,  it  gives  to  each  soul  a  glory  from  what  is  transcend- 
ent in  itself,  and  exalts  the  humblest  by  presenting  him  as  tha 

1  object  of  Divine  solicitude. 

/^   But  from  this  comes,  in  immediate  sequence,  the  constant  im 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  3^7 

pulse  t)  social  improvement;  and,  especially,  the  doctrine  of  the 
sacredness  of  the  state,  as  a  Divine  institute  for  the  protection 
and  culture  of  individuals.  This  is  not  an  indulgence  to  public 
selfishness.  It  is  not  a  tradition,  derived  from  the  Hebrevr  or  the 
Koman  commonwealth.  It  rests  on  the  same  general  basis  with 
the  right  of  the  family,  or  of  ihe'church,  though  the  special  offi- 
ces to  be  accomplished  by  the  state  are  diverse  from  theirs.  So 
long  as  it  shelters  in  just  security  of  property  and  of  life  the  indi- 
vidual citizen,  and  gives  op;:ortunity  for  his  mental  and  moral 
development  and  activity,  this  has  an  authority  from  the  Infinite 
Governor.  It  is  practically  irreligious,  in  the  contemplation  of 
Christianity,  to  fight  against  its  life.  And  even  if  the  state  does 
not  fully  accomplish  its  ends,  or  does  not  at  once  seek  to  secure 
them  with  conscious  purpose,  still,  as  an  organism  for  man's 
well-being,  it  is  part  of  the  Divine  economy  for  the  world,  and 
takes  a  fresh  permanence  from  the  teachings  of  Jesus.  Chris- 
tianity reverses,  in  other  words,  the  ancient  tendency :  and  instead 
of  working  downward  from  the  state  to  the  person,  it  works 
upward  and  outward  from  the  person  to  the  state,  making  the 
latter  more  important  because  of  the  surpassing  and  eternal  im- 
portance which  it  attributes  to  the  humblest  individual.  / 

INTo  better  illustration  of  this  can  be  given  than  that  which  i& 
presented  by  the  example  of  St.  Paul.  The  Master  had  taught  that 
his  disciples  were  to  render  to  Csesar  the  things  which  were  his ; 
and  Paul  but  amplifies  and  enforces  the  lesson  when  he  writes  to 
those  in  the  splendid  and  haughty  capital  of  the  empire,  under 
the  shadow  of  Capitoline  temples,  and  of  that  superb  Palatine 
on  which  ]N"ero  was  soon  to  build  ani  defile  his  Golden  House, 
"  Let  every  soul  be  in  subjection  to  the  higher  powers ;  for  there 
is  no  power  but  of  God ;  and  the  powers  that  be  are  ordained  of 
God For  this  cause  ye  pay  tribute,  also ;  for  they  are  min- 
isters of  God's  service,  attending  continually  upon  this  very 
thing."  * 

In  this  he  expresses  no  personal  approbation  of  the  character 
or  the  action  of  men  like  Tiberius,  Caligula,  or  ISTero.  It  is  ini> 
possible  that  he  should  have  felt  anything  but  abhorrence  foi 

♦Romans  xiii,  1,  6. 


188        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

either  of  the  men  who  in  his  time  ruled  from  the  Tiber — eacl: 
one,  as  Gibbon  tersely  expressed  it,  ^  at  once  a  priest,  an  atheist, 
and  a  God.'  He  must,  indeed,  have  felt,  in  sure  anticipation,  how 
savagely  the  power  which  was  lodged  in  such  hands  would  soon 
and  long  be  used  to  the  utmost  against  Christianity ;  of  what 
fierce  cruelties  it  would  give  exhibition,  when  once  its  passion 
was  let  loose ;  how  long  it  must  be  before  the  religion  whose  an- 
tagonism it  suspected,  and  whose  purity  it  hated,  could  gain  se- 
curity, to  say  nothing  of  supremacy,  against  such  destroying 
violence  of  rulers.  But  the  state,  as  such,  a  continuing  and  con- 
trolling political  organization,  was  to  him  as  important  as  it  ever 
had  been  to  Aristotle  or  to  Plato.  Rulers,  as  such,  because  es. 
Bential  to  the  state,  had  a  Divine  function.  This  was  true  even 
of  the  empire  which  had  conquered  his  particular  people,  which 
now  held  that  people  in  reluctant  submission,  and  which  ere 
long  was  to  light  its  iires,  and  make  bare  its  sword,  and  to  sum- 
mon dogs,  leopards,  ani  Libyan  lions,  to  sweep  from  the  earth, 
if  so  it  might,  his  consecrated  Faith. 

In  spite  of  all,  he  pleaded  his  cause,  before  Felix  first — the  in- 
famous procurator,  born  in  bondage,  and  who  exercised  in  Judea, 
according  to  Tacitus,  in  every  form  of  cruelty  and  lust,  the  pre- 
rogative of  a  king  in  the  temper  of  the  slave  * — and  afterward 
before  Festus:  not  denying  their  authority,  and  saying,  with  the 
manliness  which  always  belonged  to  him,  "  If  I  be  a  wrong-doer, 
and  have  committed  anything  worthy  of  death,  I  refuse  not  to 
die  "If  He  appealed  from  the  lower  tribunal  to  the  higher,  and 
carried  his  case  to  that  very  JN'ero  whose  name  was  already  fast 
becoming  a  synonym  for  infamy  ;  and  when  he  was  led  for  the 
last  time  along  the  thronged  Ostian  road  to  the  scene  of  his  mar- 
tyrdom, he  uttered  no  denunciation  of  the  government  whose 
sword  was  sharpened  for  his  life.  That  government  had  been 
his  protector  before,  in  cities  and  in  wildernesses,  in  the  far  in 
terior  and  out  upon  the  sea.  It  was  necessary  to  Christianity 
that  such  public  governments  should  exist ;  and  vicious  and  vile 


*  *'  Per  omnein  saevitiam  ac  libidinem,  jus  regiuin  servili  iogenio  exer* 
cult."     Histor.  V.  9. 
t  Acts  XXV.  11. 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  189 

AS  miglit  be  the  passing  imperial  rulers,  tlie  state  itself  was  a 
Divine  ordinance,  necessary  to  all  those  interests  of  nian  on 
which  the  Gospel  was  to  pour  benediction.  Politics,*as  well  as 
ethics,  were  founded  with  the  apostle  on  a  Christian  base,  or 
sprang  up  from  a  Christian  root.  The  nation  was  God's  provi- 
dential creature.  It  had  its  rightful  powers,  as  such  ;  and  some- 
time or  other  it  would  iind  out  its  duties.  The  moral  ends 
which  it  was  to  serve  imparted  to  it  of  their  own  sacredness. 

The  same  controlling  and  interpreting  idea  has  prevailed  in 
the  world  from  that  day  to  this,  wherever  the  power  of  Christi- 
anity has  gone.  Justin  Martyr  could  honestly  say,  in  his  first 
Apology  :  "  To  God  alone  we  render  worship ;  but  in  other 
things  we  gladly  serve  you,  acknowledging  you  as  kings  and  rul- 
ers of  men,  while  praying" — he  adds,  with  noble  frankness — 
^*  that  with  your  kingly  power  ye  may  also  be  found  to  possess  a 
sound  judgment."  *  So  it  has  been  ever  since.  Territorial  lines 
have  been  constantly  changing.  Forms  of  government  have 
undergone  frequent  and  vast  amendment ;  and  the  energy  of 
Christianity  has  been  never  inactive  in  enforcing  such  changes. 
It  cannot,  by  its  nature,  be  indifferent  to  the  forms  which  govern- 
ments successively  take ;  and  it  often  has  pleaded,  prayed,  and 
fouglit,  in  the  persons  of  its  most  faithful  adherents,  for  those 
which  were  freest  and  most  benign.  But  all  the  time,  the  idea 
of  the  state  as  a  part  of  God's  plan,  necessary  to  the  moral 
training  of  man,  indispensable  to  the  spread  of  Christianity  on 
the  earth,  has  been  maintained ;  and  they  who  have  felt  the  hand 
of  its  power  most  oppressively — as  the  Huguenots  of  France,  or 
the  Puritans  of  England — have  still  recognized  the  nation  in  its 
own  sphere  as  a  lawful  and  distinctly  Divine  institution. 

Governments  themselves,  so  long  as  they  serve  their  proper 
ends,  do  not  oppress  the  personal  conscience,  and  do  not  antag- 
onize the  advance  of  Christianity,  have  now,  therefore,  a  perma 
nence  which  in  earlier  times  they  did  not  equally  command.  That 
permanence  depends,  more  and  more  obviously,  on  their  coinci- 
dence with  the  deep  impulse  of  the  prevalent  religion.  If  they 
collide  with  this,  they  have  to  go  down,  not  always  as  the  walls 


Ch.  XVII. 


190        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS. 

of  Athens  were  said  to  go  down,  before  the  music  of  Doriat 
Antes,  but  sometimes  with  resounding  clamor  and  crash.  But  as 
long  as  they  serve  the  public  welfare,  and  give  free  course  to  the 
training  of  men  by  the  teaching  of  Christianity,  governments 
are  now  more  secure  than  of  old.  The  religion  which  has  im- 
pressed the  institutions  and  invigorated  the  life  of  Europe  and 
America  conserves  and  consecrates,  it  does  not  assail,  the  beneii 
cent  commonwealth. 
/  But  because  it  thus  recognizes  the  state  as  existing  in  the  Di 
vine  plan,  for  moral  purposes,  and  for  highest  welfare  in  the  per- 
sons who  compose  it,  this  religion  also,  and  of  necessity,  regards 
each  state  as  under  moral  obligations  toward  others,  correlative 
to  its  rights.  It  starts  with  that  majestic  truth,  never  more  im- 
pressively announced  than  by  Paul,  in  the  face  of  Hellenic 
pride,  and  in  front  of  the  monuments  of  Hellenic  genius,  that 
God  hath  "  made  of  one  blood  every  nation  of  men,  for  to  dwell 
on  all  the  face  of  the  earth,  having  determined  their  appointed 
times,  and  the  bounds  of  their  habitation."  *  It  sets  forth  God, 
as  exhibited  by  Jesus,  universal  Father,  Sovereign,  and  Judge ; 
whose  law  no  lapse  of  time  changes  or  wastes ;  whose  omni- 
science no  stratagem  eludes ;  against  whose  power  rebellions 
vainly  and  fruitlessly  break  ;  who  cares  for  the  obscure  as 
well  as  the  distinguished ;  who  has  a  plan  concerning  the  history 
of  mankind  on  the  earth,  and  against  the  majesty  of  whose 
spiritual  Kingdom  the  *  gates  of  Hell '  shall  not  prevail.  In  all 
its  essential  radical  teaching,  as  well  as  by  its  special  precepts,  it 
exalts  before  men  that  '  moral  order  of  the  Universe '  which 
Heffter  declares  to  constitute  finally  the  guaranty  and  the  sanc- 
\  tion  of  International  Law. 

/  The  very  conception  of  such  a  Law  could  not  have  existed  in 
I  the  pre-Christian  ages.  It  does  not  now  exist  outside  of  Chris- 
'  tendom,  or  of  the  regions  which  Christendom  affects ;  any  more 
than  does  the  English  oak  on  the  arid  Arabian  plains,  or  tlie 
date-palm  of  the  tropics  in  the  climate  of  Labrador.  The  Euro- 
pean countries  and  colonies,  with  the  nations  which  liave  sprung 
from  them,  and  which  remain  affiliated  with  them  in  blood  and 


*  Acts  xvii.  26. 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  l91 

m  religion, — these  are  the  home  of  International  Law  ;  and  if  the 
religion  which  has  educated  and  ruled  these  had  not  appeared,  it 
is  possible,  perhaps,  that  cathedrals  might  still  have  been  builded, 
and  chivalri&B  have  been  organized,  and  rituals  of  w^orship  have 
been  elaborated  ;  but  there  is  no  sign  on  the  pages  of  history 
that  this  modern,  voluntary,  and  beneficent  Law  would  have 
been  developed,  as  we  see  it  to  have  been  in  human  society 

It  is  a  fact  of  obvious  significance,  in  connection  with  this, 
that  the  first  great  and  enduring  text-book  of  this  branch  of 
juridical  science,  long  used  as  such  in  couiis  and  universities, 
and  still  referred  to  with  constant  respect,  was  written  by  Gro- 
tius :  that  '  Miracle  of  learning,'  in  his  earlier  years ;  that  illus- 
trious sufferer  for  his  convictions,  in  his  maturity ;  who,  as  his- 
torian, philosopher,  theologian,  ambassador,  and  as  an  eager  and 
lucid  Christian  apologist,  has  held  the  admiration  of  two  cent- 
uries and  a  half ;  whose  study  of  the  Scriptures  was  wide  and 
exact,  and  the  purity  of  whose  life  corresponded  with  the  lessons 
which  thence  he  derived.  More  than  two  hundred  and  seventy 
years  ago,  a.d.  1609,  his  "  Mare  Liberum  "  was  published  ;  six- 
teen years  after,  during  his  exile  in  France,  his  greater  work, 
"  De  Jure  Belli  ac  Pacis."  The  public  conscience  of  the  world 
may  almost  be  said  to  have  been  awakened,  it  was  certainly  im- 
mensely instructed  and  stimulated,  by  this  profound  Christian 
jurist,  who  fitly  leads  the  lengthening  series  of  those  who  have 
given  to  the  same  surpassing  and  fascinating  theme  their  accu- 
rate learning,  their  vigor  and  perspicacity  of  thought,  their  clear 
perception  of  governing  principles,  and  their  careful  judgment 
of  ethical  I'ules.  He  wrote  in  the  midst  of  the  eighty  years' 
war  which  his  countrymen  waged  for  their  independence ;  and 
others  who  have  followed  him  have  written  in  the  midst  of 
plenty  and  peace,  and  not  un frequently  in  the  cloistered  air  of 
great  universities.  .  But  they  and  he  have  alike  derived  their 
substantive  principles  from  the  facts  and  the  spiritual  truths  de- 
clared in  Christianity,  and  have  more  and  more  distinctly  meas- 
ured their  cumulative  precepts  against  its  governing  Golder. 
Rule.  And  the  Law  which  they  have  articulated  and  illustrated— 
it  has  survived  many  resistances,  it  has  been  elaborated  by  many 
discussions,  it  is  now  more  wddely  dominant  than  ever;  even 


192        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS. 

noij-Christian  peoples  feel  its  attraction,  while  acknowledging  it* 
pressure ;  it  bids  fair  to  become  tlie  omnipresent  law  of  the- 
World. 

It  is  instinictive  to  observe  what  and  how  ranch  has  already 
been  done,  under  such  leadership,  to  make  the  nations,  as  moral 
persons,  responsive  to  him  who  stood  among  the  humblest  of  his 
time,  but  who  claimed  for  himself  transcendent  prerogatives, 
and  whose  impress  upon  history  has  certainly  been  unique. 
Certainly,  no  ideal  attainment  has  yet  been  realized.  The 
structure  of  universal  and  beneficent  Law,  for  which  the  philan- 
thropist fondly  looks,  has  hardly  risen,  even  now,  above  its 
foundations  or  lower  stories.  But  it  has  accurately  kept  it» 
level  with  the  general  Christian  education  of  mankind  ;  and 
some  advances  have  plainly  been  made  toward  those  finest  and 
highest  relationships  of  nations  in  which  centuries  to  come,  we 
may  surely  hope,  will  be  bright  and  benign.  This  has  been  ac- 
complished, against  whatever  obstacles,  precisely  as  the  Christian, 
doctrine  of  states  has  gained  power  in  the  world  ;  as  they  have 
been  more  distinctly  recognized  as  constituted  by  a  Divine  pur- 
pose, as  having  moral  functions  to  fulfil,  and  as  thus  under  a 
constant  obligation  to  respect  each  other,  while  conserving  their 
particular  powers  and  rights ;  and  the  peaceful  victories  of  this 
new  civilization  can  hardly  be  misconceived  when  interpreted 
as  having  prophecies  in  them. 

The  whole  aim  of  the  Law  is  in  harmony  with  the  religion  to 
which  its  genesis  is  due,  and  it  but  applies  to  organized  states^ 
those  essential  principles  of  equity  and  humanity  which  the 
Master  showed  as  God's  rule  for  mankind.  It  seeks  to  make 
the  mutual  relations  of  nations  kindly  and  cordial ;  to  diminish 
the  risks,  or  facilitate  the  termination,  of  collisions  between 
them ;  to  make  the  peculiar  treasures  of  each  accessible  to  all , 
and  to  give  to  each  the  amplest  opportunity  for  fulfilling  the 
Divine  and  beneficent  office  intrusted  to  it.  Of  course  it  is  not 
an  extemporized  structure,  this  Law  of  Nations,  or  one  built  in 
the  air.  It  rests  on  foundations  of  historic  jurisprudence,  while 
expressing  the  larger  and  better  judgment  now  prevailing  in 
civilized  states  as  their  intellectual  and  moral  life  has  been 
quickened  and  enriched,  and  applying  the  governing  principle* 


TOWAED  BACH  OTHER,  ]93 

of  justice  ill  new  relations,  as  society  becomes  extended  and 
complex.  But  its  constant  aspiration  is  perhaps  not  too  boldly 
stated  by  Savigny,  when  he  speaks  of  it  as  '  by  its  veiy  nature 
aiming  at  confounding  national  distinctions  in  a  recognized  com- 
munity of  different  nations.' 

It  begins  with  recognizing  the  right  to  exist,  in  every  state, 
with  the  independence  and  sovereignty  of  each  in  its  own  sphere, 
and  its  equality  of  privilege  with  others :  admitting  here  no  dif- 
ference between  the  larger  and  the  smaller,  the  older  or  the  more 
recent  states.  It  recognizes  the  right  of  each  to  preserve  its  ex- 
istence, to  maintain  its  repute,  to  protect  its  citizens,  and,  as  far 
as  it  may  without  injury  to  other:,  to  confirm  and  increase  all  its 
resources.  It  treats  every  state  as  under  obligation  to  care  for 
those  whom  its  government  affects,  to  conduct  toward  other  na- 
tions with  justice  and  good  faith,  to  assist  the  weaker  when  they 
are  imperilled,  perhaps,  in  an  extreme  case,  to  interpose  forcibly 
for  maintaining  the  general  interests  of  humanity,  or  for  punish- 
ing unrighteous  aggression:  as  the  English,  French,  and  Russian 
fieets  combined  to  destroy  the  Turkish  navy,  in  the  battle  of 
Navarino,  ad.  1827,  and  to  secure  the  autonomy  of  Greece ;  as 
live  principal  European  powers  acted  together  in  the  treaty  of 
A.D.  1831,  to  separate  Belgium  from  the  Netherlands,  and  to 
give  it  independence ;  as  Russia  lately  singly  interposed  on  be- 
half of  the  Bulgarians,  cognate  in  religion,  though  not  in  race, 
and  affiliated  with  it  by  many  sympathies.  How  far  this  right 
of  armed  intervention  on  the  part  of  strong  nations,  to  secm'e 
the  existence  of  one  endangered,  to  erect  a  new  one,  or  to  inflict 
chastisement  for  wrongs — how  far  this  may  be  carried  is  un- 
doubtedly a  question  not  yet  fully  answered.  The  ground  is 
one  on  which  precedents  conflict,  and  where  lines  of  definition 
have  hardly  hitherto  been  sharply  drawn.  Much  here  remains 
to  be  done  by  those  who  accept,  and  by  those  who  formulate.  In- 
ternational Law  ;  of  whose  judicious  and  influential  expositors 
it  is  a  boast  of  this  country  that  she  has  produced  her  full  pro- 
portion, and  among  them  some  of  the  most  distinguished. 

But  plainly  the  tendency  is  constant  and  strong — it  is  like 
the  silent  but  powerful  current  of  an  ever-full  river — toward 
.holding  each  state,  in  the  tribunal  of  nations,  as  subject  to  the 
13 


19J:        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

sovereign  rale  of  justice  and  reciprocity,  which  the  teaching  of 
Christianity  constantly  emphasizes.  Moral  obligations  are  always 
recognized  as  resting  upon  it,  which  time  does  not  impair,  noi 
distance  limit,  nor  strength  surpass — which  bind  it  in  its  rela- 
tions to  other  states,  and  to  the  citizens  of  those  states,  and 
which  cannot  be  set  aside  by  even  an  adverse  immemorial  usage: 
as  the  diplomatic  agents  of  our  Government  have  been  formally 
instructed  that  such  usages  are  not  to  be  recognized  as  of  con- 
trolling obligation. 

Each  nation,  of  course,  must  accept  for  itself  the  rule  over  it 
of  International  Law ;  there  is  no  exterior  authority  to  compel 
this ;  but  when  accepted,  it  becomes  a  part  of  the  law  of  the 
land,  and  binds  alike  the  most  absolute  despotism,  the  most  lib- 
eral monarchy,  the  most  freely-organized  democratic  republic. 
The  power  which  is  manifested  in  its  rapid  development,  and  its 
growing  authority,  is  simply  the  changed  spirit  of  society  in 
the  regions  of  Christendom ;  and  the  steady  extension  of  those 
prevalent  sentiments  of  equity  and  humanity  which  Christianity 
has  made  familiar  to  men  appears  illustrated  nowhere  else,  tO' 
the  historical  student,  with  finer  precision,  or  on  a  level  more 
exalted.  The  permanent  and  powerful  states  of  the  world  are 
giving  constantly  clearer  witness  to  the  salutary  power,  regula-^ 
tive  and  inspiring,  which  resides  in  this  religion. 

A  few  illustrations  will  mark  sufficiently  the  steadiness  and 
strength  of  this  beneficent  advance. 

The  sacredness  of  treaties — that  is,  of  national  contracts  for 
the  future — where  these  have  been  constitutionally  made,  by 
those  having  authority  for  the  purpose,  where  they  rest  upon 
no  false  representations,  and  involve  no  so-called  obligation  to 
acts  of  essential  injustice :  this  is  now  recognized,  as  a  matter  of 
course,  among  Christian  states.  Any  nation  denying  it  would 
be  unanimously  excluded  by  others  from  fellowship  with  them, 
while  such  denial  should  be  maintained.  Undoubtedly  there 
are  methods  by  which  even  this  imperative  obligation  can  be 
more  or  less  successfully  evaded ;  and  a  considerable  part  of  the 
history  of  diplomacy  is  occupied  and  disgraced  by  the  records 
of  the  efforts  of  skillful  men  thus  to  limit  or  escape  the  binding 
force  of  an  assumed  obhgation.     But  as  hypocrisy  was  well  de* 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  19a 

BCi'ibetl,  ill  tiie  terse  maxim  of  Kochefoacauld,*  as  '  an  homage 
which  vice  pajs  to  virtue,'  so  these  endeavors,  with  all  their  inge- 
nuity, and  their  occasional  success,  only  emphasize  the  fact  that 
each  Christian  state  now  regards  a  treaty  as  sacredly  controlling 
until  it  is  terminated  in  accordance  with  its  provisions. 

So  in  the  interpretation  of  treaties,  the  rules  formulated 
by  Grotius,  and  afterward  passing  into  general  acceptance,  are 
moral  and  liberal :  applying  to  the  terms  employed  established 
customs  of  language ;  interpreting  strictly  whatever  clauses  im- 
pose hard  conditions ;  interpreting  with  a  large  liberality  what- 
ever favors  justice  and  humanity ;  where  treaties  have  been 
made  with  different  parties,  the  later  of  which  conflict  with  the 
earlier,  giving  the  right  of  precedence  to  the  earlier,  in  moral 
obligation,  as  in  the  order  of  time.  N"o  treaty  is  maintainable, 
in  the  forum  of  nations,  which  binds  the  parties  to  acts  of  in- 
justice or  bad  faith.  If  they  shelter  themselves,  in  accomplishing 
8uch  acts,  behind  the  alleged  obligations  of  their  contract,  their 
crime  but  becomes  the  more  detestable,  and  the  moral  indig- 
nation of  civilized  states  is  hotter  against  them. 

Contrast  this,  then,  with  the  preceding  condition  of  things, 
not  among  barbarians,  but  among  the  civilized  states  of  an- 
tiquity, where  the  occasional  truces  were  brief,  where  hostages 
were  taken,  on  either  side,  to  secure  the  fulfilment  of  the  agree- 
ment, and  where  the  agreement  almost  invai-iably  only  held 
until  it  was  convenient  for  one  party  to  break  it :  contrast  the 
state  of  things  which  now  is,  among  nations  vastly  larger, 
stronger,  and  more  seK-conscious,  with  that  which  obtained  in 
mediaeval  Europe,  where  again  hostages  were  exchanged,!  where 
the  oath  in  support  of  a  treaty  was  taken  upon  sacred  relics,  or 
in  the  name  of  the  Holy  Trinity,  in  the  hope  of  deepening 
tliereby  the  fear  of  breaking  it,  as  well  as  the  sense  of  its  binding 
obligation,  and  where  power  and  opportunity  were  still  com- 
monly conceived  to  give  license  to  escape  from  even  such  rein- 
forced obligations — and  the  difference  is  immense.     It  has  been 


*  " Maxim es  Morales":  ccxviii. ;  Paris  ed.,  1868. 

t  This  continued  as  late  as  the  peace  of  Aix-la-Chapelle,  A.D.  1748.     See 
Pres.  Woolsev,  "Introd.  to  Int.  Law,"  New  York  ed.,  1879:  p.  177. 


190        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

wrought  in  part,  no  doubt,  by  the  impulse  of  a  wiser  political 
sagacity ;  but  it  rests,  fundamentally,  on  the  quicker  and  more 
commanding  sense  of  a  moral  obligation  for  faithfulness  and 
veracity,  abiding  on  states  as  well  as  on  persons :  and  that  haa 
come  from  the  broadening  range,  and  the  more  distinct  and  con- 
trolling impression,  of  the  principles  and  spirit  of  the  Christian 
religion.  Because  the  God  whom  Jesus  declared  to  mankind  ia 
recognized  now  as  the  God  of  all  men,  and  as  a  God  who  judges 
peoples  at  least '  in  the  earth,'  because  the  laws  of  public  and  pri- 
vate morality  are  seen  to  be  the  same,  immortal  and  universal  in 
Divine  obligation,  nations  more  surely  keep  their  promises,  and 
consult  equity  in  their  dealings. 

The  business  of  an  ambassador,  representing  his  state  at  a 
foreign  court,  was  formerly  defined  as  that  of  lying  for  his  coun- 
try. It  has  often  been  said  of  diplomatists  that  they  fulfilled 
the  sarcastic  description  given  of  men  by  Yoltaire's  capon,  in  his 
famous  dialogue, '  using  language  to  conceal  their  thoughts ';  and 
to  many  of  them  might  certainly  have  been  applied,  in  more 
than  one  sense,  the  Spanish  proverb,  "  The  mouth  that  says  Yes 
Bays  Ko."  An  intentionally  false  statement  now  made  by  any 
accredited  envoy  of  a  Christian  state  would  discredit  him  at 
home  even  more  than  abroad,  and  would  put  a  stigma  on  the 
name  of  his  nation  which  would  burn  to  the  bone,  if  he  were- 
not  disgraced.  Indeed,  the  very  residence  of  ambassadors  ai 
foreign  courts,  which  is  itself  of  recent  origin,  with  the  inviola- 
bility which  is  recognized  as  of  right  belonging  to  them,  show« 
the  changed  relations  of  nations  to  each  other:  not  only  the 
freer  intercourse  between  them,  which  is  in  large  part  the  result 
of  the  commerce  to  which  Christianity  has  given  expansion,  but 
their  growing  disposition  to  fulfil  justice,  to  exercise  courtesy, 
to  promote  reciprocities  of  feeling  as  of  trade,  and  to  regard 
each  other,  while  equally  sovereign  in  their  own  spheres,  as  in 
essential  permanent  fellowship,  and  equally  amenable  to  the  par- 
amount claims  of  moral  obligation. 

It  is  another  natural  result  of  the  new  influence  which  haa 
breathed  upon  men — since  the  severing  force  of  local  religions 
passed  away,  which  had  given  the  consecration  of  ancestral  wor- 
ships to  the  sharp  separations  between   different  peoples,  and 


TOWARD  BACH  OTHER.  197 

Since  one  religion,  with  celestial  characteristics,  overlooking  all 
distinctions  of  race,  has  been  commonly  accepted  as  given  of  God 
for  the  guidance  of  mankind — that  the  former  restrictions  on 
the  entrance,  transit,  or  residence  of  foreigners  in  modern  states 
have  almost  wholly  disappeared.  They  may  now  be  naturalized, 
after  a  little,  on  easy  conditions,  in  nearly  every  principal  state, 
unless  they  prefer  to  continue  to  dwell  there  as  domiciliated 
strangers.  Yet  we  need  not  go  back  to  the  days  before  the 
shepherds  of  Bethlehem  thought  they  saw  the  midnight  light^ 
or  E"azareth  heard  the  voice  of  the  Teacher,  to  find  strangers 
regarded  outside  of  Palestine  as  natural  enemies,  liable  to  be 
treated,  wherever  found,  with  capricious,  often  with  a  destroying 
violence.  The  doctrine  of  Aristotle,  that  Greeks  might  make 
war  on  peoples  who  were  unwilling  to  be  enslaved  as  readily  as 
hunters  chased  wild  beasts,  being  under  no  higher  obligation  to 
them — this  doctrine,  as  interpreted  by  the  kindred  Roman  feel- 
ing that  the  stranger  was  naturally  an  enemy,  held  equal  place 
where  Hellenic  philosophy  was  not  known,  but  where  the  Ro- 
man spirit  survived.  For  many  centuries,  oppressive  usages 
toward  strangers  were  as  common  and  severe  in  Western  Europe 
as  they  ever  had  been  in  the  South  or  East.  The  parable  of  the 
Good  Samaritan  was  long  in  making  its  just  impression  upon 
the  hearts  and  minds  of  men.  It  has  not  wholly  done  it  yet. 
Eut  though,  at  the  time  when  it  was  spoken,  it  was  almost  as 
great  a  miracle,  of  wisdom  and  grace,  as  the  opening  of  the  eyes 
of  the  blind  was  of  power,  by  degrees  the  subtile  transforming 
energy  which  had  it  for  one  of  its  instruments  has  worked  upon 
nations,  as  well  as  on  persons,  to  produce  the  results  in  which  we 
rejoice.  Christianity  has  made  the  stranger  a  friend,  and  opened 
the  gates  of  the  nations'  hospitalities. 

Yery  marked  is  this  in  the  treatment  of  exiles :  who  have  na 
country,  and  for  any  injury  done  to  whom  it  is  known  before- 
hand that  the  nation  which  has  deprived  them  of  inherited  rights 
will  make  no  remonstrance,  and  will  seek  no  redress.  In  the 
liberal  hospitality  now  proffered  to  such,  and  the  careful  proteo- 
tiou  extended  by  the  laws  over  their  persons,  properties,  and 
new  homes,  we  see  illustrated  the  beneficence  inculcated  by  the 
Master  of  Christianity  toward  those  who  are  only  connected  with 


198        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

us  by  the  common  human  relationship  to  God.  At  the  same 
time,  the  provisions,  now  so  general,  for  the  extradition  of  crim- 
inals  escaped,  and  their  surrender  to  the  country  whose  lawa 
they  have  violated,  shows  as  well,  from  the  opposite  side,  the 
ever-extending  recognition  among  states  of  the  primacy  of  jus- 
tice over  local  self-assertion,  and  of  the  obligation  which  rests 
upon  each  to  maintain  the  laws  which  that  justice  ordains.  The 
provision  which  commonly  appears  in  such  treaties,  that  no  per- 
son shall  be  surrendered  on  account  of  purely  political  offences, 
shows  how  wholly  subordinate,  in  the  widening  moral  con- 
sciousness of  the  World,  are  political  rules,  rulers,  and  institu- 
tions, when  matched  against  social  and  moral  interests,  or  when 
set  side  by  side  with  the  unseen  equities  which  make  forgery, 
outrage,  murder  punishable,  in  all  tribunals. 

Many  other  instances  might  be  presented,  illustrating  the 
progress  of  the  governing  moral  sentiment  of  manldnd,  under  the 
influence  of  Christianity,  and  the  fresh  impression  which  this  al- 
ways is  making  on  the  rules  which  obtain  between  separated  na- 
tions.  Some  of  them  are  more  signal  than  those  which  I  have 
cited :  the  combination  of  states  to  crush  piracy,  for  example, 
and  its  actual  extinction  on  the  ocean  in  our  own  time ;  the  com- 
bination of  such  states  to  suppress  the  slave-trade,  and  the  vast 
success  which  has  attended  their  continued  and  costly  efforts ; 
the  positive  refusal  of  the  Law  of  Kations  to  legitimize  slavery 
— whose  basis  and  protection  are  remitted  wholly  to  local  law ; 
the  consequent  refusal  of  Christian  states  to  give  up  the  bond- 
man escaped  from  his  bondage,  and  the  general  application  of 
the  shai-p  French  rule,  which  in  effect  is  also  the  English,  that 
*  the  air  makes  free,'  and  that  a  cargo  of  slaves  stranded  on  the 
shore  is  liberated  by  touching  it;  the  ever  advancing  opening  of 
streams  to  peaceful  commerce,  so  that  now,  according  to  a  recent 
authority,  '  there  is  scarcely  a  river,  in  the  Christian  portions  of 
the  world,  the  dwellers  on  whose  upper  waters  have  not  the  right 
of  free  communication,  by  God's  channels,  with  the  rest  of  man- 
kind,'*— so  that  even  the  principal  straits  of  the  world,  long 
jealously  guarded  by  the  nations  whose  control  of  them  seemed 


♦  Pres.  Woolsey :  "  Introd.  to  Int.  Law  ":  New  York  ed.,  1879 :  pp.  85-ft 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  199 

vital  to  their  security,  are  now  opened  to  peaceful  navigation  • 
these,  vrith  other  like  examples,  show  the  progress  of  the  human*- 
it  J  and  the  liberal  justice  which  took  their  amazing  impulse  in 
the  world,  and  have  taken  since  their  constant  support,  from  the 
religion  taught  by  Jesus. 

I  understand  perfectly  that  commerce  has  wrought  in  the  same 
direction,  under  the  new  temper  impressed  on  it ;  and  that  many 
arts,  and  physical  mechanisms,  unknown  to  antiquity,  have  fur- 
nished the  wheels  on  which  the  more  generous  and  ethical  civili- 
sation of  our  time  has  been  carried  toward  its  throne,  as  Roman 
generals  were  borne  in  chariots  along  shouting  streets  toward 
the  gates  of  the  Capitol.  But  the  vital  force  which  commerce 
^nd  invention  have  had  to  serve,  from  which  they  have  drawn 
their  own  silent  yet  constant  incentive — it  came  at  the  outset 
from  the  religion  taught  in  Judea :  among  a  people  as  narrow  in 
their  sympathies,  and  as  rude  in  their  arts,  as  the  world  then  saw ; 
who  had  sent  out  no  colonies,  who  sought  no  alliances  which 
were  not  for  their  immediate  interest,  and  transient  at  that,  and 
who  had,  perhaps,  in  the  time  of  the  Master,  no  single  sail  or  keel 
of  their  own  on  any  sea  in  all  the  world  outside  of  Palestine. 

If  any  say,  therefore,  '  You  are  simply  recounting  the  succes- 
sive steps  of  our  adv^ancing  civilization,'  I  answer,  Yes !  but 
whence  does  this  '  civilization '  come  ?  !N'ot  from  letters,  and 
beautiful  arts ;  else,  why  was  it  wanting  in  the  Hellenic  states, 
to  which  the  world  turns  at  this  hour  for  their  unsurpassed 
models  ?  !N"ot  from  accumulating  wealth,  and  power ;  else,  why 
was  Eome,  mistress  of  the  world  and  centre  of  its  riches,  so  des- 
titute of  the  moral  culture  which  now  makes  Christendom  a 
great  confederacy  of  social  commonwealths?  Kot  from  com- 
merce ;  or  Carthage  and  Alexandria  should  have  anticipated 
New  York  and  London  in  their  aspiration  for  the  peace,  pros- 
perity, and  progress  of  mankind.  It  has  not  come  from  demo- 
<?ratic  institutions ;  for  they  coexisted  with  piracies  on  the  seas, 
and  with  fiercest  feuds  and  slaveries  on  the  land  ;  and  the  modi- 
fications which  they  since  have  received  have  been  the  effect  of 
a  power  working  on  them  from  outside  themselves.  It  certainly 
has  not  come  from  improved  mechanisms ;  for  looms  and  steam-, 
engines,  while  they  may  be  the  ministers,  are  never  the  authors 


200        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

of  spiritual  lessons,  and  the  fact  that  men  travel  at  forty  milea-^ 
an  hour,  or  send  messages  hy  lightning,  would  only  make  colli- 
sions between  them  more  frequent  and  destroying  if  some  un- 
seen energy  had  not  wrought  on  their  minds  to  change,  in  a  meas- 
ure  at  least,  the  temper  out  of  which  such  collisions  in  other 
days  incessantly  sprang. 

There  is  no  such  radical  force,  peculiar  and  eminent  in  the 
modern  world  as  it  was  not  in  the  ancient,  other  than  Christi- 
anity. This  makes  the  difference,  when  we  trace  that  difference 
to  its  source,  between  states  of  our  time  and  those  of  the  day  of 
Themistocles,  or  of  Trajan.  And  if  this  were  now  universally 
prevalent,  over  persons  and  peoples,  the  evils  which  remain,  and 
whose  gloom  seems  sometimes  portentous  to  us,  would  disappear, 
as  clouds  are  scattered  from  the  sky,  or  are  fused  into  colors  of 
amethyst  and  opal,  before  the  conquering  radiance  of  the  sun. 
Lord  Eacon  was  certainly  right  in  affirming  that  "  there  never  has 
been  in  any  age  any  philosophy,  sect,  religion,  law,  or  other  dis- 
cipline, which  did  so  highly  exalt  the  good  which  is  communica- 
tive, and  depress  the  good  which  is  private  and  particular,  as  the 
holy  Christian  Faith."  * 

But  passing  these  and  other  particulars,  there  is  still  a  branch 
of  the  subject  to  be  noticed,  of  vast  importance,  and  set  against 
a  lurid  background :  the  amelioration  introduced  under  Christi- 
anity in  the  customary  laws  and  usages  of  War. 

Whether  war,  under  any  circumstances,  can  be  brought  into 
interior  harmony  with  the  spirit  and  the  teachings  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion,  is  a  question,  as  I  need  not  remind  you,  which  has 
been  largely  and  long  discussed,  and  on  which  earnest  and  elo- 
quent writers  have  taken  with  emphasis  the  negative  side.  By 
none,  perhaps,  has  it  been  more  persuasively  treated  than  by 
that  eminent  Christian  philanthropist  the  centennial  anniversary 
of  whose  birth  was  recently  observed  both  here  and  in  Europe, 
and  of  whom  it  may  be  said,  as  he  said  of  another  distinguished, 
teacher,  that  "  so  imbued  was  he  with  the  spirit  of  Peace,  that  \i 
spread  itself  around  him,  like  the  fragrance  of  sweet  flowers."  f 


"  De  Augmentis  :  VII. :  1. 

t  Dr.  Channiag,  on  Noah  Worcester :  Works :  Vol.  5  :  p.  115. 


TOWARD  BACH  OTHER.  20i 

Into  this  question  it  is  not  my  province  now  to  enter.  It  is  \ 
enough  to  say,  what  is  obvious  to  all,  that  the  books  in  which 
Christianity  is  presented  contain  no  precept  against  war  which 
is  mandatory  in  terms,  and  in  range  universal ;  that  the  cases  oi 
the  centurions  at  Capernaum  and  Cesarea,  both  of  whom  are 
mentioned  with  special  approbation,  would  have  seemingly  given 
occasion  for  such,  if  such  had  lain  in  the  intent  of  the  Master,  or 
of  his  minister ;  that  the  frequent  references  made  by  the  apostles 
to  the  armor,  weapons,  and  discipline  of  soldiers,  are  unaccom- 
panied by  any  denunciation  of  the  military  service  in  its  own 
nature;  that  the  saying  of  the  Lord  to  Pilate,  *if  my  kingdom 
were  of  this  world,  then  would  my  servants  fight,'  may  imply 
that  the  forcible  defence  of  secular  rights  was  not  regarded  by 
him  as  otherwise  than  appropriate,  as  it  certainly  was  usual ;  and 
that  most  of  the  earlier,  with  many  of  the  later  expositors  of 
Christianity,  agree  with  Augustine  in  the  maxim  that  *  to  fight 
is  not  necessarily  a  sin,  though  the  object  of  war  should  always 
be  the  recovery  of  peace ':  while  it  is  obviously  difficult  to  see 
how  one  is  at  liberty  to  defend  his  own  household,  or  his  own 
life,  from  a  violence  which  assails  it,  how  any  state  can  properly 
punish  a  flagrant  offender  against  its  laws,  if  such  a  state  may 
not  equally  protect,  by  war  if  necessary,  its  life  and  honor  against 
unjust  assault.  It  would  seem  that  chaos  must  come  in  society,  ^ 
that  the  civilized  must  be  always  at  the  mercy  of  the  barbarous, 
that  the  fiercest  and  most  unsparing  robber  must  in  the  end  be 
master  of  the  world,  if  this  right  were  denied. 

But  while  this  is  true — and  while  it  is  true  that  war  some-\ 
times  gives  occasion,  and  even  incitement,  to  the  nobler  senti- 
ments of  courage,  patience,  fidelity  to  conviction,  patriotic  de- 
votion, and  that  out  of  it  has  come,  as  among  the  Dutch  or  the 
English  fighting  against  Spain,  a  more  superb  and  shining  tem- 
per as  well  as  an  augumented  power — it  is  true  also,  with  equal 
certainty,  that  Christianity  seeks,  and  naturally  contributes,  to  *" 
limit  shai-ply  the  number  of  wars,  confining  them  to  those  which 
have  the  amplest  justifying  grounds;  and  that  by  its  teaching, 
and  by  the  whole  strain  of  its  influence  in  the  world,  it  tends  to 
make  war  in  the  end  unnecessary,  putting  all  peoples  which  faith, 
(ally  receive  it  into  relations  of  cordial  and  helpful  mutual  charity    -. 


202        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

It  alone,  with  a  governing  beneficence,  can  j)ut  a  period  to  \^  ars  on 
the  earth.  And  while  it  must  sadly  be  admitted  that  its  influence 
as  yet  in  this  direction  has  not  been  as  general  or  as  effective  as 
might  have  been  hoped,  it  is  certain  that  if  ever  it  comes  to  uni- 
versal practical  sovereignty,  war  will  have  passed,  with  piracy 
and  with  slavery,  into  the  class  of  things  abolished.  Offensive 
wars  will  then  be  impossible,  while  wars  of  defence  will  no  more 
be  needful.  The  real  and  final  "  Truce  of  God  "  will  then  have 
come ;  and  the  sentence  against  war  contained  in  the  song  of  the 
^  herald-angels  will  at  last  be  fulfilled. 

But  while  Christianity  has  not  as  yet  abolished  war,  it  has 
done  much,  w^hich  we  gratefully  may  recognize,  to  mitigate  its 
usages,  and  to  make  what  are  commonly  called  its  *  laws '  less 
savagely  severe.  This  is  certain ;  and  the  distinct  influence  of 
the  religion  can  be  accurately  traced  on  the  rules  which  obtain 
in  this  department  among  separated  states.  The  personal  action 
and  temper  of  men  are  first  affected,  and  then,  as  Sir  James  Mack- 
intosh said,  "  as  the  mitigated  practice  has  received  the  sanction 
of  time,  it  is  raised  from  the  rank  of  mere  usage,  and  becomes  a 
part  of  the  Law  of  ^Nations."  * 

Thus  the  law  of  reprisals,  if  not  wholly  abrogated,  is  yet  soft- 
ened and  restrained  in  modern  times,  and  the  principle  tends  to 
be  established  that  *  rights  ought  not  to  be  violated  by  one  na- 
tion because  they  have  been  by  another ';t  especially,  that  all 
injury  done  to  private  subjects  of  a  belligerent  power  by  a  nation 
at  war  with  that  should  be  reduced  to  the  narrowest  limits.  The 
line  is  drawn,  ever  more  distinctly,  between  combatants  and 
non-combatants  ;  and  the  theory  that  each  subject  of  one  hostile 
power  is  at  war  with  every  subject  of  the  other,  drifts  continu- 
ally out  of  sight.  The  effect  is  to  confine  the  inevitable  injuries 
of  war,  as  far  as  possible,  to  persons  and  properties  within  the 
range  of  organized  warfare ;  and  the  burning  of  unoffending 
villages,  the  slaughter  of  peasants,  the  sweeping  off  of  spoils  from 
homes  and  churches,  are  now  regarded  as  belonging  to  a  sav- 


*  Misc.  Works :  London  ed.,  1846,  Vol.  I.:  p.  360. 
t  Pres.  Woolsey :  "  Introduction  to  Int.  Law  ";  New  York  ed.,  1879  :  p 
188. 


TOWARD  BACH  OTHER.  203 

agery  which  the  whole  spirit  of  modem  national  culture  hate^ 
and  rebukes.  Even  the  common  coast-wise  fishing  was  allowed 
by  our  Government  to  go  on  undisturbed  in  our  war  with  Mex^ 
ico ;  and  similar  instructions  were  given  by  their  government 
to  the  French  naval  officers  in  the  war  with  Kussia,  a.d.  1854. 
The  exchange  of  fish,  provisions,  and  the  common  utensils,  be- 
tween the  Eussian  and  IS'orwegian  coasts,  was  then  forbidden  to 
be  interrupted  in  the  White  Sea. 

In  the  same  line  of  advance,  the  practice  of  privateering  falls 
more  and  more  into  discredit  under  the  Christianized  law  of  na^ 
tions,  and  it  is  not  far,  we  may  reasonably  hope,  from  being  for- 
bidden by  all  civilized  states.  The  argument  in  defence  of  it 
has  naturally  been  that  it  assures  the  power  to  a  smaller  state, 
possessing  a  large  commercial  marine,  to  contend  with  a  larger, 
equipped  with  a  more  effective  fieet.  But  so  many  are  the  evils 
connected  with  it,  so  stimulating  is  it  to  cruelty  and  rapacity,  so 
vast  and  incessant  are  its  risks  of  abuse,  that  in  countries  morally 
advanced  energetic  influences  have  long  been  at  work  to  secure 
its  abolition.  The  powers  which  concluded  the  Treaty  of  Paris, 
A..D.  1856,  declared  it  abolished.  Our  government  declined 
to  accede  to  that  proposal,  on  the  ground  that  wnth  it  ought  to  be 
connected  another  provision  by  which  private  property  of  all 
subjects  or  citizens  of  a  belligerent  power  should  be  exempted 
from  seizure,  even  by  public  armed  vessels  of  the  enemy,  unless 
the  same  were  contraband  of  war.  It  was  affirmed,  in  other 
words,  by  our  government,  as  the  just  and  humane  policy,  and 
the  policy  was  approved  by  many  nations,  not  only  to  abolish  the 
evil  of  privateering,  but  to  secure  entire  immunity  to  merchant- 
vessels  engaged  in  lawful  pacific  trade.  In  a  treaty  of  the  United 
States  with  Italj^,  a.d.  1871,  a  provision  to  tliis  effect  was  in- 
corporated. 

In  general  it  may  be  said  that  peace  is  now  recognized  among 
Christian  states  as  their  normal  condition,  war  as  the  exceptional 
and  sad  interniption ;  that  the  redress  or  prevention  of  injuries 
is  the  only  motive  allowed  to  justify  the  appeal  of  battle,  instead 
of  conquest  or  of  plunder;  that  war  is  required  to  be  waged  only 
between  governments,  not  against  the  passive  inhabitants  of  the 
countries  involved ;  that  the  smallest  amount  of  inflicted  injury 


201        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

consistent  with  effective  prosecution  of  the  war,  is  a  growing  de* 
uiand ;  and  that  the  law  of  retaliation,  if  not  wholly  repudia 
ted,  is  in  practice  reduced  to  its  lowest  terms.  The  doctrine  of 
Burke  is  now  the  real  doctrine  of  Christian  states :  that  '  war* 
are  not  massacres  or  confusions,  but  the  highest  trials  of  right '; 
that  '  the  blood  of  man  should  never  be  shed  but  to  redeem  the 
blood  of  man.  It  is  well  shed  for  our  family,  for  our  friends, 
for  our  God,  for  our  country,  for  our  kind.  The  rest  is  vanity ; 
the  rest  is  crime.'  *  A  sense  of  accountableness  to  history  and 
to  God  more  and  more  attends  the  proclamation  of  wars.  The 
employment  of  barbarian  allies,  formerly  unquestioned,  is  now 
expressly  and  generally  discountenanced.  The  poisoning  of 
springs,  the  employment  of  assassins,  the  use  even  of  weapons 
whose  chief  effect  is  the  infliction  of  pain,  are  explicitly  con- 
demned. The  obligation  to  adhere  to  the  common  civilized  cus- 
toms of  war  in  a  contest  with  savages  is  distinctly  accepted ;  the 
plunder  of  a  town  after  assault  is  stigmatized  as  criminal  by 
high  military  authority ;  while,  as  I  have  said,  the  tendency  to 
humane  treatment  of  prisoners  grows  always  more  commanding. 
The  ladies  of  highest  position  in  England  who  went  out  to 
the  hospitals  at  Scutari,  under  the  heroic  lead  of  Miss  Nightin- 
gale, and  many  of  whom  sacrificed  life  in  the  distant  and  deadly 
philanthropical  service,  designed  their  mission  for  the  special  re- 
lief of  British  soldiers  ;  but  the  example  was  so  lofty  and  inspir- 
ing that  like  all  such  examples  it  has  sent  its  force  forward,  over 
other  lands,  into  other  years.  The  Sanitary  and  the  Chiistian 
Commissions,  in  our  civil  war,  applied  their  ministries  of  aid 
and  relief  to  the  sick  and  wounded  on  either  side.  The  Rules 
of  War  prepared  by  Dr.  Lieber,  at  the  request  of  our  govern- 
ment, A.D.  1863,  simply  affirmed  and  clothed  with  authority 
what  the  Christian  judgment  of  the  country  demanded,  even 
amid  the  strain  and  agony  of  that  vast  struggle  for  national 
unity.  In  their  spirit  of  wise  practical  humanity  they  may  al- 
most be  said  to  have  marked  an  era  in  the  history  of  war,  espec- 
ially of  civil  war — formerly  the  most  bitter  and  bloody  of  all. 


*  First  Letter  on  a  Regicide  Peace ;  Works ;  Boston  ed.,  1839  ;  Vol.  IVj 
p.  388. 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  205 

The  Convention  at  Geneva,  in  August  a.d.  1864,  in  which  the 
plenipotentiaries  of  twelve  European  states  took  part,  was  as- 
sembled to  make  more  careful  provision  for  the  treatment  of 
soldiers  wounded  in  battle,  and  for  the  neutrality  of  sanitary 
supplies,  surgeons,  nurses,  and  ambulances.  The  subsequent 
Convention,  at  the  same  city,  a.d.  1868,  besides  amending  the 
previous  articles,  extended  similar  provisions  to  wounded  or 
shipwrecked  marines.  The  laws  of  war  were  not  changed,  but 
full  security  was  sought  to  be  given  to  those  engaged,  under  its 
conditions,  in  the  work  of  attending  on  the  wounded  and  sick. 
Thirty-one  governments,  on  both  hemispheres,  have  now  adopted 
the  articles  of  the  treaty — our  own,  to  its  shame,  not  being 
among  them  ;  and  the  red-cross  of  those  engaged  in  the  benef- 
icent service  has  since  been  seen,  far  to  the  front,  on  many  hard- 
fought  and  bloody  fields.  At  another  Convention,  held  in  the 
same  interest  of  humanity,  at  St.  Petersburg,  a.d.  1868,  repre- 
sentatives of  even  Turkey  and  Persia  appeared,  among  the  dele- 
gates from  seventeen  states ;  and  at  that  held  in  Brussels,  a.d. 
1874,  at  the  invitation  of  the  Emperor  of  Eussia,  all  European 
states  of  importance  were  represented,  and  an  attempt  at  lea&t 
was  made,  though  certainly  with  no  very  signal  success,  to  lay 
down  'rules  practically  humane  and  progressive'  for  the  con- 
duct of  all  international  wars. 

Of  course  war  has  not  ceased  to  be  attended  with  terrible  se- 
verities. What  Burke  said  of  the  temper  of  insurrection  is  still 
more  true  of  the  temper  of  war :  "  the  Uttle  catechism  of  the 
rights  of  man  is  soon  learned,  and  the  inferences  are  in  the  pas- 
sions."* The  ancient  boast  of  the  Huns  has  not  yet  ceased  to 
be  heard,  that  'where  villages  and  cities  stood,  horses  may  run.'f 
But  remembering  the  former  times — the  denial  of  quarter,  the 
merciless  killing  of  the  captured,  the  enslaving  of  prisoners,  the 
fearfully  savage  guerilla  strifes,  the  un rebuked  sack  of  cities 
where  every  vilest  passion  of  man  had  its  free  ferocious  exer- 
cise— remembering  the  sack  and  conflagration  of  Seleucia,  under 
the  generals  of  Marcus  Aurelius  the  illustrious  Stoic,  with  the 


*  "  Thoughts  on  French  Affairs  ":  Works :    Boston  ed.,  1839,  Vol.  IV. 
p.  28. 

t  Gibbon  :  Boston  ed.,  1854,  Vol.  4 :  p.  202. 


206        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS, 

slaughter  of  three  hundred  thousand  inhabitants — remembering 
Magdeburg  or  Haarlem,  or  in  our  century  Badajos  and  St.  Se- 
bastian— it  may  surely  be  said  that  the  moral  sense  of  the  world 
has  advanced,  as  concerning  even  the  usages  of  war.  The  great 
recent  armed  struggles  in  Europe  have  aimed  to  secure  such  a 
balance  of  power  as  would  preclude  their  repetition  ;  and  the 
best  results  for  h'bertj^  and  progress,  as  well  as  for  national  honor 
and  security,  are  now  sought  to  be  snatched  from  the  bloody 
hand  of  public  stnfe  :  as  emancipation  of  the  slaves  came  from 
our  prolonged  civil  war ;  as  the  autonomy  of  new  Christian 
states,  in  the  fairest  portions  of  eastern  Europe,  was  the  fruit- 
ful result  of  the  recent  war  between  Kussia  and  Turkey.  The 
time  may  not  be  as  distant  as  it  has  seemed  when  courts  of  Ar- 
bitration shall  be  established — as  proposed  by  Henry  Fourth,  by 
St.  Pierre,  by  Leibnitz,  Kant,  Bentham,  and  others — to  which 
questions  between  nations  shall  be  submitted,  and  by  which 
wars  shall  be  precluded.  This  is  one  of  the  '  dreams  of  good 
men,'  many  of  which  have  already  been  realized  in  the  progress 
of  this  illustrious  branch  of  juridical  science.  This  one  waits 
longer  to  be  accomplished.  But  the  drift  of  civilization  is 
steadily  toward  it,  so  far  as  that  is  affected  by  Christianity ;  and 
even  Japan,  in  a.d.  18T5,  under  the  light  which  has  freshly 
dawned  on  those  '  Islands  of  the  morning,'  submitted  a  question 
between  itself  and  Peru  to  be  determined  by  arbitration. 

The  definition  of  the  maxims,  the  extension  of  the  sway,  of 
this  most  voluntary,  spiritual,  and  general  of  human  laws  can  only 
be  secured  by  the  prevalence  of  the  sentiments  of  equity  and 
humanity,  the  impression  of  the  sacredness  of  inter-state  duties, 
and  the  common  sense  of  obligation  to  God,  all  of  which  Chris- 
tianity inculcates.  So  far  as  it  has  gone,  it  has  simply  illustrated, 
while  it  also  has  helped,  that  moral  civilization  which  is  rooted 
in  what  has  been  scornfully  called  *  the  sweet  Galilee  vision  ., 
Its  future  must  depend  on  the  general  progress  of  the  peoples 
of  the  earth  in  that  peculiar  moral  development  and  spiritual 
culture  to  which  the  first  cosmical  impulse  was  given  by  Jesus.  A 
distinguished  English  commentator  upon  it,  Mr.  Ward,  has  tem- 
perately said  that  Christianity  '  has  gone  furthest  of  all  causes 
to  introduce  notions  of  humanity  and  true  justice  into  the  max 


TOWARD  EACH  OTHER.  207 

Jms  of  the  world ' :  while,  looking  at  what  has  been  achieved^ 
it  certainly  is  not  vain  to  expect  that  such  public  moral  and 
Christian  progress  is  still  to  go  on,  till  Peace  shall  be  every- 
where, and  Milton's  majestic  but  not  fanciful  vision  of  the 
Christian  commonwealth  shall  be  fulfilled  in  the  experience  of 
states.  If  that  time  comes,  it  will  come  only  when,  in  his  im- 
perial phrase,  *  the  forces  of  united  excellence  shall  meet  in  one 
globe  of  brightness  and  efficacy,'  and  wisdom  shall  at  last '  be- 
girt itself  with  majesty.' 

When  such  states  are  formed  and  compacted,  as  incorporeal 
complex  persons,  under  the  governing  Christian  law  of  justice 
and  of  charity,  then  shall  be  accomplished  what  the  Eoman 
Empire  grossly  prefigured,  when,  in  the  amazing  development  of 
its  force — as  under  some  brooding  Providence  above — it  flung 
forth  its  avenues  toward  the  ends  of  the  earth,  and  sought  to 
bind  all  peoples  together  under  the  power  which  ruled  from  the 
Tiber:  what  Charlemagne  perhaps  dimly  contemplated,  in  the 
splendid  rashness  of  his  colossal  and  impracticable  plan,  when  he 
sought  to  reestablish  the  Western  Empire  with  more  august 
sanctions  and  in  a  richer  religious  life,  over  the  Europe  which 
had  replaced  the  old  :  what  Napoleon  the  First  sketched  in  a  sort 
of  lurid  caricature  on  the  canvas  of  history,  when  he  rushed 
abroad,  with  what  appeared  irresistible  legions,  for  the  conquest 
of  the  Continent,  and  the  combination  of  its  several  kingdoms 
under  the  sovereign  leadership  of  France.  A  plan  sui^passing  \ 
all  of  these,  as  the  bending  sky  surpasses  the  clouds  which  drift 
across  it — even  that  will  have  been  realized,  when  the  different 
nations,  each  on  its  untroubled  territory,  each  with  its  idioms  of 
custom,  law,  as  well  as  language,  and  each  with  its  peculiar  life, 
shall  be  united  in  the  bonds  of  a  peace  which  knows  no  suspi- 
cion and  admits  no  suspension,  because  it  results  fj-om  the  vol- 
untary subjection  of  each  and  all  to  a  Law  universal:  whose 
authority  is  conceded  because  a  Divine  majesty  and  charm  are^ 
recognized  in  it. 

Our  eyes  may  not  see  it ;  they  probably  will  not.  But  the 
coming  centuries,  which  will  look  back  upon  ours  as  mechanical 
Rnd  rude,  shall  rejoice  in  its  advent.  And  whenever  it  comes,  it 
will  be  surely  attested  by  history,  as  already  it  is  predicted,  that 


208        A  NEW  CONCEPTION  OF  DUTIES  OF  NATIONS. 

I  not  to  statesman,  philosopher,  scholar,  has  it  chiefly  been  due ; 
not  to  the  imperial  Stoic,  declaring  in  lofty  but  frigid  phrase 
that  '  the  nature  of  man  is  rational  and  social,  and  that  so  far  as 
Antoninus  is  a  man,  the  world  is  his  city ';  not  to  inventor,  har- 
nessing the  lightnings,  channeling  the  hills,  overruling  the  resist- 
ance of  wind  and  wave;  not  to  merchant,  or  bold  explorer,  mali 
ing  men  familiar  with  other  climes;  and  not  to  jurist,  forma 
lating  codes  for  conservation  of  interests,  and  seeking  to  apply 
the  principles  of  justice,  as  reason  discovers  them,  to  the  infinite 
variety  of  human  concerns.    All  these,  and  others,  will  have  dono 

\ their  work  and  borne  their  part  for  the  great  consummation. 

/  But  another  than  they  will  have  made  one  enlightening  and 
reconciling  religion  universal  in  the  world ;  another  than  they 
will  have  shown  the  rule  and  the  judgments  of  Him  in  serving 
whom  states  find  their  glory ;  another  than  they  will  have  built 
up  the  ultimate  Christian  opinion,  omnipresent  with  mankind, 
by  which  treaties  will  be  tested,  policies  measured,  strifes  con- 
demned ;  another  than  they  will  have  given  universal  value  and 
effect  to  every  sentiment  of  equity  and  of  charity  of  which  the 
rare  illuminated  souls,  under  his  inspiration,  will  have  felt  the 
authority.  It  will  be  he  who  said  of  old,  amid  the  fierce  and 
fighting  confusions  of  which  the  world  in  his  time  was  full,  in 
words  as  simple  as  those  of  a  child,  but  kinglier  than  Augustus 
ever  had  spoken,  "All  things,  whatsoever  ye  would  that  men  should 
do  to  you,  do  ye  even  so  to  them  ":  and  who  said  later,  in  front  of 
the  cross  whose  shadow  already  was  falling  upon  him,  "  And  I, 
if  I  be  lifted  up  from  the  earth,  will  draw  all  men  unto  me  "  ! 
He  expected  the  race  to  receive  his  religion.  He  died  that  it 
might.  And  the  renewed  earth,  wherein  dwelleth  righteousness, 
will  bear  on  all  the  illustrious  pages  of  its  resplendent  final  his- 
tory, the  impress  of  his  thought — who  had  studied  in  no  Hab. 
binic  school,  who  had  heard  no  word  from  Platonist  or  from  Stoic,^ 
who  wrote  no  sentence  unless  in  the  sand,  who  wore  no  crown 
save  one  of  thorns,  but  who  spoke  of  himself  as  the  Judgt;  of 
all  nations;  who  first  on  earth  announced  the  idea  of  a  universal 
spiritual  Kingdom,  wide  as  the  race  and  continuing  forever;  and 
of  whom  even  the  officers  said,  with  their  insolence  rebuked  and 
\   their  spirit  subdued,  '^JS'ever  Man  spake  like  this  Man" ! 


LECTURE    VII 


THE  EFFECT  OF  CHKISTIANITY   ON  THE  MENTAl* 
CULTURE  OF  MANKIND. 


LECTURE  Vlt 

In  considering  the  effect  produced  by  Christianity  on  the  in- 
tellectual  power  and  culture  of  mankind,  we  are  faced  by  three 
indisputable  facts  which  seem  perhaps  to  contradict  the  reality, 
or  certainly  the  principal  and  permanent  importance,  of  any 
such  effect.  The  first  is,  that  in  some  respects  the  most  signal 
examples  of  mental  faculty  and  intellectual  attainment  of  which 
history  keeps  the  record  preceded  the  preaching  of  Christianity 
in  the  earth,  and  occurred  among  those  Hellenic  peoples  whose 
polytheism  was  most  various  and  fantastic.  The  second  is,  that 
there  have  been,  by  admission  of  all,  long  intervals  of  time  in 
which  Christianity,  or  what  was  held  to  represent  it  in  the  world, 
has  had  particular  prominence  and  control,  but  during  which  the 
aspiring  intellectual  spirit  has  been  sharply  restrained  from  its 
legitimate  plans  and  efforts ;  has  been,  indeed,  so  suspected  and 
disesteemed,  in  the  ecclesiastical  conception  of  its  worth,  that  the 
impulse  to  free  and  various  action  was  not  so  much  shackled  as 
nearly  fatally  stifled.  The  third  fact  is,  that  many  men,  within 
Christendom,  of  noble  powers  and  remarkable  attainments,  of 
learning  like  Gibbon's,  of  a  speculative  genius  like  that  of 
Spinoza,  of  a  culture  like  Goethe's,  have  seemed  to  others,  per- 
haps to  themselves,  in  no  degree  indebted  to  the  Christian  Faith 
for  the  mental  energy  born,  quickened,  and  cultivated  in  them. 
Indeed,  such  men  have  often  been  specially  prompt  and  positive 
in  denying  the  tendency  of  the  religion,  as  they  understood  it, 
to  expand  or  inspire  the  high  faculties  of  man.  They  have 
looked  upon  it  as  naturally  discrediting  the  finer  tastes  and  the 
nobler  forces  which  give  to  the  soul  its  delicacy  and  dignity; 
and  have  repeated  the  old  accusation,  old  as  Celsus,  probably 
older,  that  Christianity  attributes  the  errors  of  the  world  to  its 

(311) 


^12  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

cultivated  wisdom,  and  whatever  is  good  in  thought  and  charac- 
ter to  a  silly  simplicity. 

These  facts  must  be  recognized;  and  certainly  at  first  they 
appear  formidable,  as  against  the  idea  that  Christianity  has  done, 
or  is  fitted  to  do,  anything  distinguished,  or  of  secular  import- 
ance, in  the  direction  in  which  we  now  follow  it.  Yet  some 
things  should  be  said,  on  each  of  these  facts,  which  may  in  a 
measure  limit  the  force  with  which  they  controvert  such  an  idea. 

In  regard,  for  example,  to  the  illustrious  minds  appearing  in 
Christendom,  but  admitting  no  personal  indebtedness  to  the  an- 
imating religion  by  which  that  is  pervaded,  it  is  fairly  to  be 
said  that  many  others,  at  least  as  eminent  in  their  various  depart- 
ments, have  gladly  and  reverently  ascribed  to  this  religion  the 
primal  light  and  invigorating  force  by  which  their  splendid 
powers  were  cherished ;  that  they  have  even  found  an  argument 
for  it  in  its  fitness  and  tendency  to  affect  each  noblest  force  of 
the  mind  with  beneficent  effect ;  and  that  those  who  have  de- 
nied this  may  have  been  unaware  how  much  they  owed  to  the 
atmosphere  of  society,  which  was  richly  stimulating  or  nobly 
exalting  because  it  had  for  centuries  been  vitalized  by  the  sub- 
tile power  of  this  religion.  The  California  pine,  or  the  tropical 
palm,  the  graceful  elm  of  the  New  England  meadows,  or  the 
lignum-vitge  of  the  South,  may  seem  independent,  each  in  its 
own  height  and  strength,  of  the  influences  around  it.  But  take 
away  the  shining  and  the  shower  of  which  it  daily  illustrates  the 
blessing,  transport  it  to  more  stubborn  soils  and  bleaker  airs,  and 
the  elegant  grace  or  the  stately  strength  is  dwarfed  and  enfeebled  ; 
the  tough  fibre,  the  stimulating  juices,  or  the  flavorous  nut,  are 
^  no  more  found.  In  like  manner,  it  is  not  easy  to  analyze  the 
influences,  invisible,  elusive,  but  omnipresent  and  of  spiritual 
efiicacy,  which  pervade  society  as  Christianly  organized,  and 
which  act  more  or  less  on  every  soul  born  to  the  inheritance  of 
its  diffused  and  undefined  energy.  Even  the  minds  which  have 
€et  themselves  deliberately  or  fought  fiercely  against  Christianity 
have  sometimes  shown,  therefore,  with  unconscious  emphasis, 
how  much  they  owed  to  that  religion  which  they  repelled.  In- 
deed it  seems  not  extravagant  to  say  that  the  very  abundance  of 
the  ingenious  and  eloquent  attacks  made  on  Christianity  in  the 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  213 

lands  over  which  its  influence  extends  is  itself  an  indication  oi 
its  exuberant  stimulating  force.  Intensity  of  light  is  measured 
by  the  depth  of  shadows;  and  the  variety  and  energy  of  *  free- 
thinking'  have  a  natural  relation  to  the  invigorating  intellectual 
force  of  the  religion  which  that  assails. 

In  regard  to  the  fact  that  Christianity,  or  what  was  accepted 
as  such,  has  at  times  been  unfriendly  to  genial  and  large  intel- 
lectual progress,  it  must  be  observed  that  it  is  by  no  means  to  be 
taken  for  granted  that  it  was  Christianity,  in  its  essential  original 
life,  and  not  some  human  substitute  for  it,  which  loaded  with 
weights  or  fettered  with  chains  the  excursive  and  daring  intel- 
lectual spirit.  It  may  have  been  a  quite  different  system,  which 
had  taken  the  name  without  inheriting  the  sweetness  or  the 
majesty  of  the  religion;  which  had  really  forgotten  precept  and 
parable,  with  all  lofty  and  various  instruction,  in  its  zeal  for  a 
hierarchy,  or  for  dogmatic  human  Confessions ;  w^hich  was  sensi- 
tive, therefore,  because  uncertain  of  interior  soundness,  its 
jealousy  of  tlie  inquisitive  mind  increasing  with  its  consciousness 
of  exposure  to  attack.  History  will  attest,  I  think,  if  carefully'^ 
questioned,  that  it  has  not  been  the  religion  of  the  Kew  Testa- 
ment, freely  distributed  among  reading  peoples,  which  has 
menaced  or  cursed  intellectual  freedom ;  that  it  has  been  some- 
thing of  human  origin,  which  feared  the  sharp  edge  of  analysis, 
or  the  slower  erosion  of  a  searching  reflection,  and  which  so  has 
sought  to  silence  discussion,  and  to  shelter  itself  from  the  reach 
of  debate,  behind  arbitrary  bulwarks.  And  surely  no  system 
should  be  held  accountable  for  what  another  may  have  done, 
masquerading  in  its  name. 

Finally  it  must  be  remembered  that  genius  is  always  the  gift  I 
of  God,  which  comes  as  it  is  sent,  and  is  not  humanly  commanded. ) 
It  is  possible  that  the  diamond  may  sometime  or  other  become 
an  article  of  human  manufacture ;  though  chemists  and  lapidaries 
are  by  no  means  expectant  of  that.  But  the  jewel  of  genius, 
which  no  diamonds  can  buy,  is  not  explained  in  its  production 
by  any  sociology,  and  no  facts  of  environment  serve  either  to 
ensure  or  to  forbid  its  appearance.  The  cottage  is  its  birth- 
place, oftener  than  the  palace.  It  is  found  by  travellers  among 
barbarous  tribes.     The  history  of  peoples  widely  differing  from 


214  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIAJS'ITY 

each  other  is  at  points  illustrated  by  it.  The  times  which  had' 
seemed  least  likely  to  develop  it,  have  sometimes  been  most 
prolific  in  it.  It  comes  only  from  those  supreme  and  mystical 
processes  in  which  the  Almighty  energy  works ;  and  the  sadden 
revelation  of  it  may  not  unnaturally  have  anticipated  Christen- 
dom, or  may  now  lie  wholly  outside  its  lines.  If  therefore  we 
look,  as  certainly  we  do,  to  Homer  for  the  great  example  of 
native  supremacy  in  epic  song,  to  ^schylus  as  the  father  of 
tragedy,  to  Plato  and  the  Stagirite  as  the  masters  of  philosophi- 
cal speculation  and  method,  to  the  eminent  orators  and  historians 
of  Greece  as  unsurpassed  in  all  the  elements  which  constitute 
power  and  which  confer  intellectual  renown — ^if  we  marvel  be- 
fore the  men  whose  writings,  like  those  of  the  three  great  tra- 
gedians, were  preserved  by  law  in  the  archives  of  the  state — 
there  is  nothing  in  this  to  cast  a  shade  on  Christianity. 

It  is  still  apparent  that  the  religion  of  these  men  contributed 
little  to  their  development :  that  skies  and  seas,  the  liberties  and 
the  commerce  of  Greece,  its  games  and  contests  and  historic  as- 
sociations, are  enough  to  explain,  if  not  the  genesis  of  phenom- 
enal genius,  the  swift  and  splendid  ripening  of  its  powers,  in 
that  active,  aspiring,  and  in  many  respects  most  fortunate  people. 

/  It  is  also  to  be  observed  that  the  period  of  various  and  splendid 
intellectual  activity  in  Greece  was  relatively  brief,  covering  a 
time,  from  the  archonship  of  Solon  to  the  battle  of  Chceroneia, 
about  as  long  as  that  embraced  in  the  rapid  records  of  either  of 
several  American  cities.  That  inspiring  activity  had  passed  into 
history,  and  had  ceased  to  be  a  present  force  in  society,  centuries 
before  Christianity  was  heard  of.  This  want  of  prolonged  and 
continuing  force,  and  of  reproductive  power,  in  the  Attic  de- 
velopment, may  be  variously  explained ;  but  it  cannot  properly 
fail  to  be  recognized  in  connection  with  the  unsurpassed  gift* 
and  gains  which  confessedly  belong  to  the  great  age  of  Athenian 

\  letters. 

If  now  we  turn,  released  for  the  time  from  these  primary  ob- 

'^^jections,  to  consider  Christianity  in  its  relation  to  a  powerful, 
wide,  and  salutary  effect  on  the  mind  of  mankind,  it  is  not,  I 
think,  extravagant  to  say  that  it  appears  constitutionally  adapted, 
In  its  structure,  spirit,  and  even  in  the  instruments  by  which  ita 


ON  TEE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  215 

teaching  is  conveyed  to  the  world,  to  produce  precisely  such  an 
effect;  while  the  fact  that  it  has  accomplished  such,  to  an  extent 
unequalled  by  other  religions,  appears  as  certain  as  that  summer- 
time is  warmer  than  winter,  or  that  the  continent  on  which  we 
stand  is  not  built  and  braced  of  fluctuating  waters.  It  has  edu- 
cated peoples,  and  not  merely  individuals.  It  has  at  the  same 
time  stimulated  and  nourished  the  higher  minds,  into  which  it 
had  entered  with  their  acceptance.  Its  effect  in  this  specific 
direction  has  been  not  transient  but  enduring;  and  where  its 
power  has  been  most  largely  and  vitally  exerted  it  has  laid  most 
deeply  the  essential  foundations  for  intellectual  progress,  and 
provided  most  amply  its  instruments  and  incentives.  These  are 
facts  which  seem  to  me  evident  in  the  structure  of  Christianity, 
and  in  its  recorded  career  in  the  world;  and  if  we  are  not  mis-'^ 
taken  about  them,  the  inference  certainly  cannot  be  a  rash  one 
that  a  system  adapted  to  such  rich  effects,  on  the  cosmical  scale, 
and  for  centuries  of  time,  must  at  least  have  the  sympathy  of 
the  mind  of  God ;  that  so  far,  certainly,  it  is  worthy  to  have  had 
— whether  in  fact  it  did  have  or  not — its  lofty  origin  in  His  wis- 
dom for  the  world. 

A  tendency  to  such  effects  is  inherent  in  Christianity :  this  is 
the  point  first  to  be  considered. 

That  its  effect  on  its  earliest  disciples  was  intellectually  re- 
markable, as  well  as  immense  in  the  moral  transformation  which 
was  accomplished,  no  one,  I  think,  who  admits  the  even  partial 
correctness  of  the  primitive  accounts  of  them  and  of  their 
labors,  will  hesitate  to  concede.  If  Peter  wrote  either  of  the 
epistles  attributed  to  him — and  that  he  wrote  the  first,  nearly  all 
will  agree—  he  certainly  had  not  been  dwarfed  in  mind  by  the 
Faith  which  he  confessed  and  taught.  On  the  other  hand,  a  more 
notable  change  can  hardly  be  imagined,  in  the  sphere  of  simply 
intellectual  development,  than  that  which  becomes  apparent  in 
him  between  the  time  when  first  he  meets  us,  the  rude  and  un- 
taught fisherman  of  Galilee,  and  the  time  when  he  wrote,  perhaps 
thirty  years  after,  that  memorable  letter.  So  he  would  surely 
be  a  bold  man,  unless  a  blind  one,  who  should  question  that  the 
native  faculty  of  Paul — one  of  the  most  engaging  and  forcible 
of  all  the  reasoners  who  have  made  language  the  instrument  of 


216  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRmTIANlTY 

logic,  and  have  moulded  civilizations  by  their  intrepid  and  hardy 
discussions — had  been  spurred  and  ennobled,  instead  of  being 
any  way  enfeebled  or  hindered,  by  the  energetic  force  of  Chris, 
tianity  upon  him ;  that  he  had  gained  more  from  the  searching 
reflection  which  it  required,  on  themes  which  allure  yet  tran- 
scend man's  thought,  than  all  the  schools  of  the  rabbis  could 
have  given,  or  the  broader  schools  for  which  Tarsus  was  famous. 
Whether  John  the  apostle  wrote  or  not  the  gospel  which  adds 
a  beautiful  renown  even  to  his  preeminent  name — though  we 
should  adopt  the  extreme  opinion  of  the  latest  Dutch  writers  in 
the  interest  of  doubt,  and  say  that  'the  name  of  the  author  re- 
mains unknown,'  only  he  could  not  have  been  the  man  whom 
they  are  pleased  to  designate  as '  the  narrow  and  violent  apostle ' 
John* — the  fact  remains  that  somebody  wrote  it :  the  supremest 
work  of  human  genius,  if  it  were  not  produced  by  Divine  inspira- 

/  tion.  "Whoever  attributes  this  to  John  must  see  how  the  Faith 
which  he  loved  and  declared  had  enriched  and  illumined  his 
mental  nature.  Wlioever  attributes  it  to  any  one  else — to  some 
one  writing  on  behalf  of  an  opinion,  in  a  century  from  which  any 
creative  literarj^  energy  seemed  wholly  to  have  fled — must  stand 
amazed,  if  he  be  thoughtful,  before  the  impenetrating  intellectual 
influence  of  that  religion  which  enabled  an  unknown  Roman, 
Greek,  or  Jew,  to  pen  a  book  so  lofty  and  harmonious,  so  pictur- 
esque and  profound,  so  immense  in  reach,  so  spiritual  in  suggestion,, 
so  rich  in  inspiration  for  other  minds,  before  which  all  poetry  or 

X  philosophy  of  the  time  becomes  utterly  petty  and  commonplace. 
The  writings  of  the  earliest  witnesses  to  Christianity  certainly 
attest  the  force  which  it  had  generously  delivered  on  their  re- 
ceptive  and  answering  minds. 

But  this  may  have  been,  we  shall  doubtless  be  told,  the  effect 
of  a  sudden  enthusiasm  in  them :  a  transient  impulse  of  the 
novelty  of  their  Faith,  which  could  not  be  prolonged  into  after- 
generations,  and  which  cannot  be  expected  to  reappear.     So  the 

/  question  comes  back :  Is  there  anything  in  the  constitution  of 
Christianity  which  involves  such  an  influence,  and  which  presents 


*  Oort  and  Hooykaas  :   "  Bible  for  Learners  "  :  Boston  ed.,  1879  ;   p|v 
691,  668. 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  21 7 

^n  GHsential  promise  that  that  influence  will  be  permanent,  and 
wide  in  its  reach  ?  And  on  this  question  some  facts  may  cast 
light. 

It  is  to  be  observed,  for  example,  at  the  outset,  that  Christi- 
anity is  peculiarly  a  Book-religion,  a  lettered  Faith.  It  haa 
documents,  annals,  prophetical  admonitions,  recorded  discourses, 
lofty  hymns,  careful  biographies,  extended  letters,  which  are  the 
very  means  of  transmitting  it  to  us,  and  all  which  are  carefully 
included  in  the  volume  which  is  recognized  as  its  permanent 
text-book.  It  thus  addresses  directly,  forcibly,  and  with  mani- 
fold energy,  the  mental  faculty  in  its  disciples.  "^ 

Of  course,  it  is  not  the  only  religion  known  in  the  world 
which  presents  itself  in  a  Book.  The  Hindus,  Egyptians,  Per- 
sians, have  their  sacred  books ;  Mohammedanism  makes  its  boast 
of  the  Koran;  and  the  religions  of  Confucius  and  Lao-tse  in 
Ohina  rest  upon  ancient  venerated  writings.  But  in  most  of  these 
Yjases  it  is  to  be  observed  that  the  original  documents  are  com- 
paratively brief ;  and  that,  in  the  judgment  of  those  who  have 
studied  them  most  minutely  and  largely,  with  sincerest  desire  to 
discover  whatever  is  valuable  in  them,  they  furnish  no  basis, 
contribute  no  impulse,  to  a  diversliied  and  fruitful  general  litera- 
ture. The  hymns  of  the  liig-Yeda,  which  are  recognized  as  con- 
stituting '  the  real  Bible  of  the  ancient  Vedic  faith,'  are  only  a 
thousand  and  twenty-eight,  containing  in  all  a  little  more  than 
ten  thousand  verses.  It  is  the  subsequent  commentary  on  these 
hymns  which  spreads  out  into  large  proportions;  though,  for 
the  fullest  understanding  of  the  system,  the  three  minor  Yedas 
are  also  to  be  studied,  with  perhaps  the  Brahmanas,  or  later 
scholastic  treatises.  The  text,  with  the  commentaries,  of  the 
Thibetan  canon,  are  almost  immeasurable,  but  the  original 
Buddhist  teaching  is  contained  in.  the  narrowest  compass;  while 
t\\'d  writings  of  Confucius  are  of  no  large  extent,  and  the  princi- 
pal work  of  Lao-tse,  which  represents  the  true  Scripture  of  his 
followers,  is  said  to  consist  of  only  five  thousand  words,  and  to 
fill  not  more  than  thirty  pages.*  Almost  everywhere,  in  these 
clhnic  sacred  books,  the  nucleus  was  a  small  one.   The  subsequent 


*Max  Mailer:  "Science  of  Religion":  New  York  ed.,  1873:  p.  36. 


218  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

additions  by  disciples  constitute  the  mass  of  the  so-called  sacred 
literatures ;  and  these  additions — though  they  might  be  expected 
to  answer  somewhat  to  the  expositions,  homilies,  canons,  histories, 
commentaries,  sermons,  allegories,  poems,  theological  treatises, 
missionary  chronicles,  religious  biographies,  of  the  Christian 
Church — are  in  fact  only  hard  gradual  incrustations  upon  the 
original  teachings  of  the  masters,  not  the  fruit  of  inspired  activi- 
ties and  personal  researches  in  related  departments  of  inquiry 
and  thought. 

The  A  vesta,  attributed  to  Zoroaster,  was  probably  more  ex- 
tensive. It  is  said  to  have  contained  twenty-one  books,  of  815 
chapters,  until  revised  under  Shapur  II.,  and  the  parts  remain- 
ing comprised  in  348  chapters.  The  language  of  the  books  had 
then  long  ceased  to  be  spoken.  The  only  remains  of  them  are 
preserved  in  fragments  still  existing,  in  another  language,  among 
the  Parsees  in  India.  These  consist  of  rubrics  for  purification, 
and  for  repelling  evil  spirits,  with  invocations  and  prayers  of  a 
monotonous  character,  for  interminable  repetition.  The  very 
priests  of  the  religion  cannot  read  its  original  sacred  books.  The 
/Koran,  as  we  know,  though  held  to  have  been  dictated  word  "by 
word  to  Mohammed,  in  the  Arabic  language,  by  the  tongue  of 
the  angel  Gabriel,  contains  nothing  beyond  the  knowledge  and 
thought  of  a  semi-barbarous  Arab  of  the  seventh  century ;  and 
as  it  deals  in  precepts  rather  than  principles,  is  considered  in- 
capable of  alteration  in  any  particular  without  impiety,  and 
ceases  to  be  inspired  when  translated,  it  contemplates  no  wide 
distribution  in  other  tongues,  and  fastens  the  entire  Mohamme- 
dan world  to  the  level  and  the  circle  of  the  attainment  already 
reached  by  the  Prophet.  Its  114  suras,  or  chapters,  are  in  fact 
\so  many  fetters  on  the  mental  progress  of  those  who  receive  it. 

The  Greeks  had  in  effect  no  sacred  books.  Neither  the  early 
Orphic  writings,  hymns,  poems,  or  oracles,  nor  the  later  philoso- 
phies, ever  aspired  to  take  this  place.  The  Romans  had  none ; 
unless  we  count  such  the  Sibylline  Books,  which  were  said  to 
have  been  purchased  by  Tarquin  from  a  woman  who  suddenly 
disappeared,  which  were  kept  in  the  temple  of  Jupiter  in  the 
Capitol,  were  consulted  for  oracular  direction  in  public  emer- 
gencies, and  which   finally  were   burned,  eighty  years  before 


ON  TEE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  210 

Christ.  No  sacred  literature  enriched  the  libraries  of  scholai-a 
in  Republican  or  Imperial  times.  The  Roman  Law,  believed  to 
be  founded  in  a  sovereign  justice,  was  an  educating  force  to  the 
Roman  mind.  The  religion  which  attended  it  never  was :  and 
the  last  efforts  to  make  it  such,  when  its  end  was  drawing  near, 
were  -wholly  futile.  After  Christianity  had  long  been  preached,  \ 
and  the  attraction  and  power  of  the  books  which  contained  it  had 
come  widely  to  be  felt,  attempts  were  made  by  some  of  its  more 
learned  and  discerning  antagonists  to  supply  a  parallel  heathen 
literature,  a  sort  of  counterpart  from  the  pagan  side  to  the  pre- 
cepts and  doctrines  of  the  Gospel,  and  to  its  touching  and  mar- 
vellous records.  So  the  sophist  Pliilostratus,  in  the  early  part 
of  the  third  century,  at  the  request  of  Julia  Domna,  empress  of 
Severus,  wrote,  and  as  he  says  embellished,  the  life  of  Apolloniua 
of  Tyana,  to  offset  apparently  the  history  of  Jesus  as  related  by 
the  evangelists ;  and  so,  later  in  the  century.  Porphyry  is  said  to 
have  collected  what  were  represented  as  tlie  answers  of  Oracles, 
especially  concerning  Christianity  itself,  to  support  the  existing 
religious  system  by  responses  from  the  unseen  world. '^  But  efforts 
like  these  were  wholly  too  late,  and  the  popular  mind  was  never 
generally  or  powerfully  affected  by  them.  Heathenism  in  Rome 
had  no  affinities  with  an  affirmative  literature.  It  presented  no 
instruction.     It  sought  for  no  proofs  in  philosophy  or  in  history.  ^ 

In  contrast  then  with  all  these  religions  it  is  to  be  observed 
that  Christianity  comes  to  us  through  a  Book,  of  great  extent, 
of  immense  variety,  written  in  different  times  and  tongues,  dur- 
ing a  period  of  certainly  more  than  a  thousand  years,  and  by  the 
pens  of  many  writers;  that  this  Book  is  internally  and  organi- 
cally connected,  part  with  part,  so  that  each  section  must  be  sur- 
veyed for  the  perfect  and  assured  understanding  of  the  whole ; 
and  that  while  the  vital  substance  of  Christianity  may  be  prop- 
erly said  to  be  here  and  there  concisely  presented  in  a  single 
sentence,  the  whole  is  still  urged  on  men's  attention,  and  the 
various,  complex,  and  interlinked  scheme  draws  to  itself  the 
reverent  thought  of  those  who  accept  the  final  religion.  There 
is  really  not  a  single  portion,  from  the  first  sentence  *In  the  be- 


*  See  Augustine:  "City  of  God/'  XIX.:  33. 


^20  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITY 

ginning  God  created  the  heaven  and  the  earth,'  to  the  last 
*  The  grace  of  oar  Lord  Jesus  Christ  be  with  you  all,'  which  has 
not  some  radical  connection  with  what  anticipates  or  what 
follows.  *  What  is  latent  in  the  Old  Testament,  becomes  patent 
in  the  New ';  and  Christianity  is  essentially  the  religion  of  the 
Bible — its  life  inhering  in  all  the  parts,  as  the  life  of  the  tulip  is 
essentially  present  both  in  bulb  and  in  flower,  at  first  rough  in  its 
earthy  coat,  and  afterward  weaving  and  shining  in  the  sun  in  the 
splendid  beauty  of  t\iQ  jparterre.  The  Babylonian  captivity  has 
its  connection  with  the  subsequent  missions  of  Christian  apostles. 
Whoever  arranged  the  Temple-worship  finds  an  expositor  in  him 
who  wrote  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  And  the  first  lifeless 
•chaos,  out  of  which  the  world  is  said  to  have  arisen,  has  constant 
relations  to  the  final  promise  of  the  heavenly  Jerusalem. 

^  At  once,  then,  it  appears  what  careful  and  long-continued  at- 
tention is  sought  by  this  religion  from  those  who  would  know 
its  intimate  and  ultimate  secrets  of  meaning.  It  is,  in  fact,  the 
supreme  encomium  pronounced  in  the  world  on  the  human  in- 
telligence, that  this  religion,  which  purports  at  least  to  have 
come  from  God,  and  to  have  within  it  the  thoughts  of  His  mind, 
yet  asks  men,  impels  them,  to  examine  carefully  many  books 
in  order  completely  to  apprehend  it.  It  challenges  inves- 
tigation, solicits  study,  that  they  may  see  how  one  part  fits 
and  finishes  another,  and  how  the  whole  converges  on  the  Faith 
to  be  at  last  joyfully  received.  This  seems  an  evident  part  of 
the  prearranged  plan  of  him,  whoever  he  may  have  been,  who 

\ ushered  Christianity  into  the  world.  Its  whole  scope,  as  I  have 
suggested,  may  properly  be  said  to  be  presented  in  sentences  like 
this :  "  For  God  so  loved  the  world,  that  He  gave  His  only  be- 
gotten Son,  that  whosoever  believeth  in  him  should  not  perish, 
but  have  everlasting  life."  That  *  little  Bible'  may  be  said, 
with  truth,  to  contain  the  spiritual  sub«5tance  of  all.  Yet  while 
fluch  sayings  are  microcosmic,  embracing  'Oftlms  of  tratli  in  few 
words,  the  entire  series  of  the  writings  is  preserved,  the  most 
ancient  among  them  are  endorsed  and  commended  by  later  tea.;h- 
€rs,  and  by  him  whom  all  revere  as  their  Head,  and  all  are  pre- 
sented in  the  unity  and  complexity  of  their  manifold  parts  to 
the  intellectual  mastery  of  mankind. 


ON  THE  MENTAL  GVLTURE  OF  MANKIND,  221 

It  makes  not  the  slightest  conceivable  difference,  in  regard  to 
the  point  now  before  us,  where  or  by  whom  these  writings  are 
supposed  to  have  been  composed,  or  to  have  been  combined  m 
one  collection.  If  it  be  alleged,  for  instance,  that  Moses  was  not  the 
author  of  the  Pentateuch,  the  denial  may  affect  our  impression 
of  the  lawgiver,  perhaps  even  of  the  Lord  to  whom  he  seems 
prophetically  pointing,  and  by  whom  his  writings  appear  to  be 
accredited.  But  so  far  as  concerns  the  intellectual  activity  stim- 
ulated by  the  religion  known  as  Christianity,  that  is  only  quick- 
ened by  such  denial,  and  directed  to  new  paths,  as  men  are 
pushed  to  the  inquiry :  *  but  if  not  Moses,  who  was  the  author  ? ' 
as  they  are  moved  to  search  not  only  the  primitive  text,  but 
Egyptian  records,  Babylonian  bricks,  the  story  entombed  in  the 
figures  of  hieroglyphics  upon  the  oldest  monuments  of  the 
world,  to  find  the  proofs  of  the  authorship  of  some  one  in  thia 
majestic  and  venerable  record  of  origins  and  of  progress.  Sa 
with  the  Psalms.  That  many  of  them  were  not  written  by 
David,  as  we  in  early  life  very  likely  supposed  that  all  of  them 
were,  only  incites  and  maintains  the  effort  in  after  years  to  as- 
certain to  whom  to  ascribe  them.  So  with  the  later  prophecies 
of  Isaiah,  the  book  of  Esther,  the  book  of  Job,  and  with  some  of 
the  epistles,  the  second  of  Peter,  the  pastoral  epistles,  or  that  ta 
the  Hebrews. 

The  authorship  of  those  to  whom  these  were  early  and 
widely  ascribed  being  disputed,  a  hundred  questions  are  started 
at  once,  a  hundred  lines  of  inquiry  are  opened,  to  ascer- 
tain facts  which  are  not  indeed  of  cardinal  importance,  but 
which  must  be  of  perennial  interest  to  the  careful  student  of 
this  religion.  It  would  seem,  sometimes,  as  if  questions  of  thia 
sort  had  been  on  purpose  left  undecided,  that  each  generation 
might  come  afresh  with  keenest  interest  to  the  study  of  the 
Word,  especially  in  the  mastery  of  these  fascinating  problems. 
Partly,  indeed,  by  reason  of  this  fact,  the  mind  of  Christendom 
can  never  detach  itself  from  the  most  intent  and  thorough  in- 
quiry concerning  the  original  documents  of  its  Faith.  In  our 
own  time,  amid  the  rush  of  invention  and  commerce,  while  ques- 
tions of  politics  engage  with  a  continual  grasp  multitudes  oi 
minds,  while  exploration  of  unknown  continents,  distant  worlds 


222  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITT 

or  of  microscopic  forms  of  life,  is  incessantly  going  on,  aud 
while  the  knowledges  open  to  man  are  more  numerous,  various, 
alluring  and  rewarding,  than  ever  before,  the  thoughts  of  those 
who  are  leaders  in  thought  are  continually  busy  on  questions 
started  by  the  scriptures;  ascertaining  how  far,  to  what  an 
almost  complete  extent  the  evangelical  narratives,  in  their  prin- 
cipal facts,  can  be  reconstructed  from  the  four  unquestioned 
epistles  of  St.  Paul;  scrutinizing  them  on  the  one  hand  with 
searching  minuteness,  and  the  records  of  the  second  century  on 
the  other,  to  ascertain  what  traces,  if  any,  of  incipient  controver- 
sies can  be  detected  in  the  Synoptists  or  in  John. 

I  do  not  for  myself  hesitate  to  accept  it  as  a  part  of  the  plan 
of  the  author  of  Christianity — whoever  we  conceive  him  to  have 
been — to  leave  these  questions,  and  others  like  them,  so  far  un- 
decided that  new  discussion  should  be  always  in  order,  and  that 
the  most  exact  and  wide  investigation  should  be  never  super- 
seded. It  is  by  such  discussion  and  such  investigation  that  the 
discerning  intelligence  of  Christendom  is  constantly  trained  ; 
and  libraries  have  been  built,  we  may  almost  say  literatures 
created,  the  inquisitive,  discursive,  analytical  spirit  of  mankind 
lias  been  educated,  by  the  arguments  and  researches  so  called 
forth.  The  doubts  which  men  have  at  some  time  entertained 
concerning  the  authorship  of  one  part  or  another  of  the  Christian 
scriptures  have  been  more  instructive  in  their  final  effect  than 
many  certainties  on  common-place  themes. 

But  then,  this  preliminary  work  being  done,  when  men  come 
into  instant  responsive  contact  with  these  scriptures,  how  mani- 
fest and  how  permanent  is  their  fitness,  as  an  instrument  of 
merely  intellectual  education,  to  the  minds  which  they  address ! 

It  is  remarkable,  for  one  thing,  how  apt  they  are  to  all  periods 
of  life :  to  the  youngest  child,  who  can  understand  words ;  to 
the  most  mature  and  experienced  man,  disciplined  by  work,  and 
cultured  by  study  ;  to  even  the  aged,  who  look  inward  with  in- 
lent  introspection,  or  onward  and  up  with  desiring  hope.  They 
are  adapted  to  the  rude  and  mentally  uninstructed,  as  well  as  to 
the  man  of  churches  and  universities,  whom  a  developed  and 
furnished  society  has  assiduously  trained.  And  it  is  a  fact  oi 
indisputa)le  significance  that  while  all  other  "Sacred  Books'' 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  223 

Are  essentially  uninviting  to  those  not  taught  to  consider  tliem 
Divine — so  that,  except  as  curiosities  of  letters,  they  would 
scarcely  be  noticed  unless  by  some  indefatigable  student^— the 
Christian  scriptures,  in  both  the  Testaments,  have  an  equal  at- 
traction for  every  people  into  whose  language  they  are  carried. 
They  may  not  always  be  accepted,  but  they  uniformly  are  read, 
in  all  regions  of  the  world,  with  an  interest  which  poetry  doe? 
not  rival,  or  romance  surpass  ;  and  those  who,  under  the  contin- 
uing impression  of  their  preexisting  cnltus,  decline  to  accept 
them  as  specially  from  God,  confess  the  immense  attraction  and 
impulse  of  which  their  vital  pages  are  full.  There  are  many 
languages  into  which  it  would  be  evidently  impossible  to 
translate  either  Homer  or  Shakespeare,  Dante  or  Goethe.  But 
no  tribe  of  men  has  yet  been  found  whose  dialect  could  not  be 
renewed  and  enriched,  refined  and  expanded,  so  as  at  length  to 
take  into  itself  these  surprising  Christian  scriptures. 

Not  only  do  they  thus  engage  and  impress  men  upon  the  j 
lower  levels  of  intelligence.  They  tend,  constitutionally,  to  ex- 
alt and  reinforce  the  mental  faculty  which  they  address,  and  to 
build  up  by  degrees  a  middle-class  mind,  widely-distributed, 
sagacious,  energetic,  strong  in  conviction,  yet  free  and  active  in 
intellectual  sympathy,  a  source  of  strength  to  society  and  the 
state.  ^ 

So  much  as  this  it  seems  difficult  to  doubt,  if  we  look  either 
at  Christianity  itself,  or  at  what  as  a  specifically  literary  religion 
it  has  done  in  the  world.  Men  may  perhaps  say  that  under  it 
no  rarer  genius  has  been  developed  than  has  elsewhere  been 
shown,  no  finer  power  for  intuitive  discernment,  no  spirit  more 
capable  of  illuminating  the  canvas  or  moulding  the  marble  into 
exquisite  grace,  of  convincing  men's  judgment  and  stirring  to 
impetuous  motion  their  passion,  or  of  putting  high  thought  and 
delicate  fancy  into  noblest  rhythm  and  melody  of  verse.  But 
few  will  deny  that  there  has  been  a  power  in  the  Christian  re-  "^^^ 
ligion,  such  as  never  was  shown  by  any  other,  to  develop  and 
train  a  self-respecting  middle-class,  in  England,  for  example,  in 
Germany,  in  this  country  ;  measurably,  indeed,  though  less  com- 
pletely, in  Roman  Catholic  countries,  as  in  France  or  in  Italy. 
And  wherever  the  mind  of  such  a  class  has  been  pervaded  and 


224  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

stimulated  by  the  Christian  scriptures,  there  intelligence  ha» 
been  general,  thought  enterprising,  while  moral  forces  have  had 
peculiar  and  wide  control.  The  school  and  the  college  have 
there  come  into  existence,  as  naturally  as  harvests  rise  from  the 
soil  on  which  seed  has  been  scattered ;  presses  have  found  i 
power  more  steadfast  than  that  of  any  human  muscle  to  be  thp 
support  of  their  constant  activity ;  and  an  energetic  and  various 
training  of  the  force  native,  even  if  latent,  in  human  minds,  has 
been  successfully  sought  and  secured. 

There  was  no  such  commanding  middle-class,  permanent,  pro- 
gressive, ever  multiplying  in  numbers,  under  the  ancient  ethnic 

\  religions.  Egyptian  priests,  soldiers,  tradesmen,  peasants,  and 
the  riff-raff  of  the  populace,  were  as  sharply  separated  in  the  days 
of  Herodotus  as  they  afterward  continued  to  be.*  It  was  the 
absence  of  power  for  self-development  in  the  Athenian  democ- 
racy which  compelled  Mr.  Grote  to  say,  in  the  conclusion  of  his 
history :  "  When  such  begging  missions  are  the  deeds  for  which 
Athens  employed  and  recompensed  her  most  eminent  citizens,  a 

.  histoiian  accustomed  to  the  Grecian  world  as  described  by  He- 
rodotus,  Thucydides,  and  Xenophon,  feels  that  the  life  has  de- 
parted from  his  subject,  and  with  sadness  and  humiliation  brings 
his  narrative  to  a  close."  f  So  the  tendency  at  Home  always 
was  to  the  dizzy  height  or  the  abject  debasement,  to  the  palace 
or  the  hovel,  the  many  accomplishments  or  the  absence  of  any 
intellectual  spirit.  It  was  so,  largely,  because  the  religion  there 
prevailing  was  not  a  religion  of  doctrines,  histories,  or  moral  pre- 
cepts, of  written  records  or  a  formulated  Faith,  but  was  rather 
one  of  mechanical  arts  and  preordained  ceremonies,  of  external 

/  service,  and  interpreted  augury.  Only  a  religion  which  has 
scriptures  and  teachers,  and  which  thus  addresses  with  appro- 
priate force  the  thought-power  in  man,  as  well  as  his  moral  sen- 
sibility— only  such  a  religion  can  vitally  raise  or  thoroughly 
train  the  free,  intrepid,  and  thoughtful  populations  which  are 
besoming  the  glory  of  the  world.  It  alone  can  effectively  resist 
whatever  forces,  social  or  commercial,  tend  to  repeat  the  ancient 


*  Herodotus  :  1 :  164. 

t  "  History  of  Greece  ":  London  ed.,  1873,  Vol.  X. :  p.  328. 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  225 

results  in  modem  society.  It  shuns  or  slurs  no  class  in  society ; 
but  it  tends  always  to  lift  the  ruder  into  fellowship  with  those 
whose  mental  alertness,  expanding  information,  and  practical 
skill,  are  a  governing  power  in  civilization.  /' 

But  now  to  the  finer  and  higher  spirits  which  meet  Christian- 
ity in  its  primitive  documents,  and  in  the  continuing  impulse  of 
its  life,  what  is  its  relation  ?  Does  it  limit  and  discourage  them  ? 
does  it  fetter  their  freedom,  lower  their  aims,  and  impose  upon  . 
them,  by  an  arbitrary  rule,  unwelcome  restraints  ?  or  is  it  adapted, 
by  its  nature,  to  make  upon  them  impressions  salutary  and 
strong?  does  it  load  them,  or  lift  them?  has  it  for  them  su- 
preme inspirations,  or  does  it  simply  present  certain  confining 
and  mandatory  instructions,  to  hamper  and  harass  them  ?  Such 
questions  have  been  answered,  as  I  have  suggested,  in  opposite 
ways.   They  are  questions  of  the  gravest  interest  and  importance. 

In  connection  with  them  there  are  some  things  to  be  noticed  ^ 
in  the  peculiar  internal  constitution  of  the  concurring  scriptures 
through  which  Christianity  comes  to  the  world.  Many  minds 
are  in  these  presented  to  us ;  and  those  minds  are  often  to  an  ex- 
traordinary degree  r"feplete  with  abounding  and  animating  en- 
ergy, prepared  by  it  for  effective  operation  on  the  spirit  of 
students.  Whether  we  accept  or  not  the  idea  that  a  transcendent 
inspiring  force  was  exerted  upon  them  from  above,  it  is  certain 
that  some  energy  operated  within  them  to  give  them  peculiar 
fulness  of  life,  an  unmatched  exuberance  of  inspiriting  force,  so 
that  they  are  still  as  personal  to  mankind,  and  almost  as  proximate 
to  the  thought  of  their  readers,  as  if  living  to-day.  Their  ex- 
pressed faculty,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  was  often  surpassing,  if 
not  superlative.  Certainly  no  more  expert  and  splendid  dialec- 
tical energy  than  that  of  Paul  is  known  to  have  wrought  in  even 
the  abundant  and  delicate  Greek  tongue.  No  more  intuitive  and 
interpreting  spirit  than  that  which  penned  the  Gospel  of  John 
has  ever  subdued  to  its  sublime  purpose  the  mystery  of  speech  ; 
while  in  all  the  writers  of  the  E'ew  Testament  there  is  a  fresh- 
ness of  perception,  a  vigor  of  conviction,  an  essential  undecaying 
mcdernness  of  tone,  which  makes  them  singular  among  the 
writers  of  their  time.  Their  eager  force  in  what  they  wrote 
makes  us  almost  sensible  of  a  personal  conference  between  their 
15 


THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITT 

minds  and  ours  when  we  read.  Even  the  prophets,  the  psalm 
ists,  and  the  lawgiver,  in  the  earlier  stage  of  the  development 
of  Christianity,  tower  before  us  in  the  vividness  and  dignity  of 
an  unsurpassed  strength,  and  sometimes  touch  and   thrill   our 

\  souls  as  if  they  spoke  with  us,  face  to  face. 

Different  languages  must  be  mastered,  too,  that  we  may  come 
into  most  direct  and  intimate  contact  with  these  intense  and 
awakening  minds.  Long  courses  of  history  must  be  investigated, 
that  we  may  place  them  precisely  before  our  thought  in  their  cir- 
cumstances and  times.  The  earliest  annals  of  the  race  must  be 
sought,  stamped  on  the  clays  of  the  Euphrates  valley,  or  cut  into 
alabaster  slabs  of  Ninevite  palaces,  that  light  may  be  cast,  if 
they  have  it  to  give,  on  the  primitive  documents  of  our  Faith. 
And  when  we  come  to  the  latest  and  the  amplest  scriptures — 
while  it  is  true  that  the  affectionate  disciple  may  find  his  whole 
religion  expressed  in  brief  sentences,  as  one  may  wear  in  a  ring 
a  jewel  which  shall  cover  the  value  of  palaces  or  of  provinces,  it 
is  true  also  that  by  the  attentive,  who  would  compass  the  whole, 
great  arguments  must  be  mastered ;  that  many  knowledges 
are  requisite  even  to  set  the  Gospels  distinctly  and  fully  under 
our  view ;  and  that  there  is  no  form  of  attainment,  no  sound 
and  useful  force  of  the  mind,  which  does  not  find  its  legitimate 
oflfice  in  the  conquest  and  illustration  of  these  manifold  scrip- 
tures. They  are  as  simple  and  tranquil  in  their  appeal  to  the 
meditative  spirit  as  the  morning  star  glittering  above  the  bright- 
ening hills  in  its  challenge  to  the  eye.  But  with  them,  as  with 
that,  long  aud  minute  processes  of  thought  are  needed  for  the 
analysis  of  that  serene  splendor,  and  the  determination  of  the 
proper  height  and  weight  in  the  heavens  of  that  from  which  it 
streams  upon  us. 

/  It  must  also  be  noticed,  it  goes  without  saying,  that  the 
student  of  Christianity  is  always,  by  that  fact,  in  contact  with 
the  themes  most  majestic  and  vital  which  can  be  presented  to 
the  human  intelligence.  Whatever  his  particular  interpretation 
may  be  of  the  instruction  which  Christianity  gives  on  these 
supreme  themes,  their  dignity  and  vastness  must  be  recognized 
by  all.  Here  are  the  great  gnomic  sayings  of  the  Master  him- 
self, as  marvellous  in  the  fullness  of  their  unwaning  wisdom  as 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND,  227 

any  works  attributed  to  him  :  the  profoundest  truths  conveyed 
to  the  world  in  the  most  gracious,  lucid,  and  memorable  phrase. 
Here  are  the  alleged  discoveries  of  transcendent  facts,  such  aa 
must  be  embraced  in  any  scheme  of  religion  to  give  it  enduring 
hold  upon  the  race:  of  facts  which  pass  the  reach  of  our 
thought  as  do  unsounded  seas  the  outstretch  of  the  hand. 
The  incessant  and  eager  discussion  of  such  facts  never  fails 
among  men.  It  has  highest  charm  for  the  loftiest  spirits ;  and 
it  holds  within  it  the  clear  prediction  of  larger  scope,  a  more  ex- 
act and  interpreting  vision,  to  be  expected  in  the  Hereafter.  He 
who  meditates  upon  God,  Duty,  Immortality,  as  the  Christian 
writings  present  them  to  him,  feels  kinship  with  whatever  is 
royal  in  the  universe,  and  has  a  sovereign  sense  in  the  soul  of 
relation  to  essences  primordial  and  eternal. 

In  these  Scriptures  the  supernatural  element — professedly  at 
least,  whether  really  or  not,  I  do  not  now  ask — is  continually 
presented,  with  simplicity,  dignity,  and  a  tone  of  authority ;  is 
treated  as  familiarly,  with  as  little  attempt  at  startling  expres- 
sion as  if  it  lay  level  with  the  commonest  experience,  yet  with 
astonishing  harmony  and  majesty  in  the  outlines  and  vast  ad- 
umbrations of  its  glory.  No  greater  mistake  can  possibly  be 
made  than  to  suppose  this  amazing  supernatural  element — whose 
recognized  presence  in  the  Scriptures  leads  some  to  repel  them — 
depressing  or  harassing  to  the  stimulated  mind.  Above  all 
things  else,  it  is  the  one  power  which  exalts,  inspires,  and  rein- 
forces. It  is  so  everywhere,  and  not  merely  in  the  Scriptures. 
We  are  conscious  sometimes  of  a  strange  exhilaration  in  watch- 
ing the  storm,  when  the  burst  of  the  thunder-crash,  the  terrible 
and  incessant  illumination  of  lightnings  in  midnight  skies, 
make  the  earth  the  evident  arena  for  the  time  of  forces  which 
man  cannot  check  or  compute  :  when  it  is  as  if  the  heavens  were 
opened,  and  we  saw  forth-coming  supernal  energies.  There  is 
at  such  times  an  intensity  of  life  in  which,  as  has  been  said,  the 
mind  feels  itself  '  akin  to  elder  forces  that  wrought  out  existence 
before  the  birth  of  pleasure  and  pain.'  So,  sometimes,  when 
looking  from  deck  or  headland  on  the  sweep  of  the  ocean  in  ita 
immeasurable  majesty  of  wrath,  or  when  the  infinite  cope  of 
heaven  is  bunoj  as  with  banners  of  crimson  and  ffold  in  the  sud- 


228  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRmTlANlTY 

den  and  universal  flash  of  meteoric  phenomena,  theie  is  some- 
thing above  all  that  is  visible  which  then  strikes  down  its  gleam 
of  glorj  on  the  over-awed  and  up-looking  spirit.  It  is  the 
*  something  infinite  and  immense,'  surpassing  imitation,  surpass- 
ing conception,  which  arrests  and  uplifts  it. 

/■  But  then  we  stand  only,  after  all,  upon  the  higher  levels  of 
nature.  It  is  but  a  distant  approach  which  we  recognize  to  what 
is  really  transcendent  and  supernal.  Whenever  the  soul  does 
fairly  face  that — if  ever  it  does — in  which  eternity,  with  its  in- 
comparable splendors  and  terrors,  touches  time,  in  which  God  is 
manifest  in  His  august  life,  in  which  the  life  of  multitudinous 
spheres  superior  to  ours  becomes  the  object  of  contemplation — 
if  the  soul  be  in  any  measure  responsive,  it  must  be  supremely 
exalted  by  it.  The  great  discoveries,  the  magisterial  thoughts, 
will  then  lie  nearest  to  its  vision.  In  such  a  mood  it  will  be,  if 
ever,  that  the  falling  apple  or  the  pendulous  dew-drop  will  lift 
the  mind  to  Sirius  on  his  throne,  or  carry  it  out  to  the  nebulous 
whirls  which  God  is  moulding  into  worlds.  In  such  a  mood  it 
certainly  has  been  that  celestial  panoramas  have  unrolled  them- 
selves to  a  spirit  like  Dante's,  or  that  voices  have  been  found 
for  what  else  were  unspeakable  in  the  harping  symphonies  and 
majestic  hallelujahs  of  the  Paradise  Lost.  The  veriest  material- 
ist, who  will  not  believe  what  he  cannot  take  up  in  metallic 
tweezers,  or  weigh  in  bulk  on  Fairbanks'  scales,  can  hardly 
be  so  foolish,  if  he  ever  reads  history,  as  to  question  the  power, 
in  a  merely  intellectual  system  of  training,  of  that  apprehension 
of  things  supernatural  to  which  the  Scriptures  always  profess 
and  claim  to  minister.  Above  ethics,  philosophies,  arts  of  men, 
they  rise  through  the  immeasurable  blue,  and  purport,  at  least,, 
to  open  to  thought  celestial  gates.  One  stands  amid  them  be- 
neath skies  that  outreach  the  ring  of  suns,  in  the  midst  of 
eternities  by  which  the  briefest  anticipating  life  is  made  measure- 

\  less  in  sublimity. 

y  But  by  the  side  of  these  astonishing  discoveries,  or  what  are 
certainly  affirmed  to  be  such,  one  cannot  but  be  struck  by  the 
surprising  and  the  apparently  preaiTanged  silences,  which  mark 
as  well  the  Christian  scriptures :  silences,  upon  themes  which 
with  constant  force  attract  our  attention  ;  silences,  which  seem  as 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  229 

clearly  a  part  of  the  marvellous  purpose  and  plan  of  the  scrip- 
tures as  are  the  vacant  spaces  in  walls  through  which  the  house- 
holds dwelling  behind  them  look  out  on  landscapes  or  distant 
skies.  On  the  physical  appearance  of  the  Master,  for  example, 
or  of  either  of  his  apostles  ;  on  the  appearance,  the  manner,  or 
even  the  personal  history  of  his  Mother,  of  whom  such  astonish- 
ing stories  were  told  at  a  time  very  early,  and  to  whom  was  at- 
tributed such  an  unsurpassed  song ;  on  the  origin,  the  occupations 
and  the  powers  of  angels ;  on  the  special  constitution  of  the 
spiritual  body ;  on  the  place,  if  there  be  a  place,  for  celestial  ex- 
periences, and  on  the  possible  recognition  of  friends  amid  its 
unattained  and  superlative  wonders, — on  these,  and  other  similar 
matters,  concerning  which  the  mind  receiving  Christianity  is  in- 
cessantly busy,  the  plan  of  this  religion  leaves  it  to  be  busy, 
as  if  on  purpose  to  incite  it  to  unlimited  thought,  and  to  keep 
its  questioning  temper  and  habit  in  fullest  activity ;  while  on 
matters  graver,  and  even  momentous,  but  still  not  essential  to  itg 
practical  aim,  it  preserves  the  same  intent  attitude  of  silence, — 
not  seeking  to  explain,  if  that  be  possible,  the  relations  of  the 
human  and  the  Divine  in  its  own  constitution,  or  in  the  preemi- 
nent person  of  its  Lord ;  not  seeking  to  interpret  the  intimate 
coincidence  of  the  human  will  with  the  Divine  in  what  it  calls 
the  *  second  birth,'  or  to  solve  the  problem  of  the  origin  of  evil, 
or  of  the  harmony  of  Divine  pre-vision  with  the  unconstrained 
activities  of  men.  ^ 

Concerning  all  these  questions,  and  others,  on  which  philoso- 
phy loves  to  speculate,  which  the  mind  of  each  century  strikes 
at  afresh  as  if  they  had  never  before  been  mooted,  Christianity 
preserves  a  studious  silence.  It  leads  men  up  to  the  edge  of 
them,  often,  and  leaves  them  to  do  what  they  may  for  them 
selves,  to  search  and  sound  the  untracked  deeps. 

This  is  a  fact,  it  seems  to  me,  as  striking  and  significant  as 
any  other  in  the  whole  remarkable  constitution  of  Christianity, 
as  addressed  to  the  mental  power  in  man.  It  has  been  said  of 
La  Place  that  in  that  immense  work,  the  "  Mecanique  Celeste," 
which  has  given  to  his  name  its  splendid  lustre,  he  purposely  omit- 
ted many  demonstrations,  cancelling  them  after  thfy  h<\d  be.u 
completed,  and  simply  saying  in  place  of  them,  '  Thm   it  ap- 


230  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

pears,'  *  So  it  is  evident':  that  nobody  might  be  able,  unlesi 
through  a  labor  like  his  own,  to  go  with  him  to  his  conclusions, 
except  bj  simple  faith  in  himself.  He  opened,  in  other  words, 
enormous  crevasses  in  the  pathway  of  his  immense  calculations, 
in  the  confident  expectation  that  these  could  not  be  bridged  ; 
and  it  is  the  renown  of  his  American  translator.  Dr.  Bowditch, 
not  that  he  turned  French  into  English,  which  others  might  have 
equally  done,  but  that,  with  skill  and  stubborn  patience,  and  an 
unwearied  labor,  he  crossed  and  bridged  these  separating  chasm  a 
by  his  own  calculations,  so  that  others  could  follow  where  he 
had  led. 
y  So,  and  in  a  yet  higher  sense,  the  Christian  scriptures,  while 
setting  before  us  in  every  part  the  spiritual  attainment  which 
they  declare  to  be  possible  for  man,  and  bringing  all  possible  in- 
struments of  impression  to  impel  us  to  seek  that — extensive  his- 
tories, delightful  biographies,  great  arguments  of  doctrine,  pro- 
found maxims  of  duty  and  of  truth,  exulting  hymns,  apocalyptic 
forewarnings  of  destiny — yet  leave  these  inter-stellar  spaces  of  a 
supreme  silence,  into  which  if  one  is  moved  to  adventure  he 
must  go  alone,  to  sound  as  he  may  along  the  dim  and  periloua 
way.  There  seems  here  an  echo,  from  the  domain  of  spiritual 
truth,  to  that  first  record  of  the  Bible,  that  '  thus  the  heavens 
and  the  earth  were  finished,  and  all  the  host  of  them,  and  on  the 
seventh  day  God  rested  from  His  work.'*  In  somewhat  the 
same  way  Christianity  presents  to  the  world  which  receives  it  an 
orb  of  truth,  or  what  it  declares  such,  and  lifts  it  to  its  place 
amid  the  immensities  :  and  then  whoever  gave  it  rests,  leaving 
man  thenceforth  to  work  upon  it,  to  measure  its  mountains,  un- 
earth its  mines,  to  cross  for  himself  its  unbridged  oceans,  and  to 
set  it  if  he  can  in  just  relations  with  the  universe  of  truth.  This 
is  part  of  a  strange  and  mighty  method.  We  sometimes  speak 
of  authors  as  '  suggestive,'  because  they  conduct  to  more  than 
they  teach ;  because  our  minds,  in  passing  from  them,  are  con- 
scious of  impulse  to  a  fresh  and  keen  activity  in  many  new  di- 
lections  of  thought,  and  have  almost  arrived  at  many  truths 
vvLiok  we  must  afterward  search  out  for  ourselves.     Such  au- 


irenesis  ii.  !>  2. 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  231 

fchors  are  most  of  all  rewarding  and  inspiring.  And  the  one 
book,  in  all  the  world,  which  seems  to  me,  here  at  least,  preemi- 
nent in  literature,  is  that  brief  book  in  the  faith  of  which  so 
many  of  the  best  have  loftily  lived  and  triumphantly  died,  and 
which  either  of  us  may  carry  in  his  pocket — the  New  Testament 
of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  • 

It  is  not  true,  therefore,  it  cannot  be,  under  Christianity,  as 
has  sometimes  been  scornfully  said,  that  *  he  who  has  science 
and  art  has  no  religion.'  In  individual  instances  that  may  sadly 
be  true.  But  in  general  it  is  true  that  he  who  has  most  fully 
accepted  and  deeply  studied  the  Christian  scriptures,  provided 
his  faculty  be  equipped  for  the  work,  is  the  one  who  has  the 
finest  and  most  dehcate  feeling  for  truth  in  art,  the  most  exhil- 
arating pleasure  in  philosophical  thought,  the  deepest  delight  in 
the  real  and  final  achievements  of  science.  Take  out  from  mod- 
ern civilization  what  has  been  done  for  it,  in  physical  research, 
in  historical  exploration,  in  philosophical  construction,  specula- 
tive criticism,  or  aesthetic  endeavor,  by  Christian  scholars,  in- 
spired to  their  work  by  Christian  faith,  and  pursuing  it  with 
powers  which  that  faith  had  trained,  and  it  would  be  left  almost 
as  devoid  of  what  is  most  enriching  and  memorable  as  the  glacier 
is  of  trees,  or  Sahara  of  blossoming  shrubs.  The  variety  of  the 
intellectual  work  thus  prompted  by  Christianity  is  one  thing  re- 
markable. Its  practical  fruitf ulness  is  another.  And  the  per- 
manence and  the  widening  energy  of  the  impulse  which  still 
flows  from  it  upon  the  minds  which  it  reaches,  is  as  striking  as 
either.  Our  own  times  are  full  of  it ;  but  it  did  not  begin  with 
our  times.  It  is  as  old  as  the  religion  to  which  it  brings  its  con- 
stant illustration. 

In  spite  of  the  heathenism  with  which  that  was  saturated,  some 
of  the  more  eminent  of  the  early  Fathers,  especially  in  the  East, 
earnestly  advocated  the  careful  study  of  the  Greek  literature : 
among  them  Clement  of  Alexandria,  Origen,  Gregory  Thauma- 
turgus,  and,  later,  the  great  Basil,  who  wrote  a  discourse  in  favor 
of  it,*  Gregory  Nazianzen,  the  sainted  Chrysostom.     Platonisra 


*  Sermo   de  legendis  Libris  Gentilium:   "Opera";   Paris   ed.,   1722 
Tom.  II.,  pp.  173-185. 


232  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

was  honoi'ed  by  St.  Augustine.  Justin  Martyr  attributed  a  Di 
vine  inspiration  to  certain  parts  of  the  ancient  philosophy.  Je- 
rome quoted  Yirgil  familiarly  in  his  correspondence.  Seneca 
was  claimed  as  a  correspondent  of  St.  Paul,  and  in  the  time  of 
Jerome  letters  purporting  to  have  passed  between  them  were  in 
general  circulation.  Even  the  harsh  and  vehement  Tertullian, 
who  regarded  Plato  as  the  *  caterer  to  a  host  of  heretics,'  speaks 
of  Seneca  as  often  found  on  the  Christian  side. 

A  single  generation  after  Constantino,  when  the  schools  of 
grammar  and  rhetoric  had  been  opened  to  the  Christians,  Julian 
found  it  needful  to  his  plans  for  reviving  paganism,  not  only  to 
exclude  the  Christian  children  from  such  schools,  but  to  make 
strenuous  efforts  to  displace  the  many  instructors  of  the  same 
faith,  who,  by  reason  of  superior  fitness,  had  already  taken  posi- 
tion in  them.  The  famous  Greek  copyists,  of  whom  Alexandria 
had  been  long  the  resort,  were  reproduced,  more  numerously 
than  ever,  as  soon  as  Christianity  came  to  power ;  and  the  ut- 
most faithfulness,  patience,  skill,  of  those  who  had  transcribed 
tragedy  and  epic,  oration  and  history,  were  surpassed  in  those 
who  afterward,  with  a  higher  enthusiasm,  devoted  their  lives  to 
multiplying  copies  of  the  Christian  scriptures.  To  the  later 
monks,  of  the  mediaeval  scriptorium,  we  owe  the  preservation 
of  pagan  literature,  of  Yirgil  and  Homer,  as  of  David  and 
Moses,  of  ^schylus  and  Demosthenes,  as  of  John  and  Paul. 
And  when  the  pen  doing  its  utmost,  with  practiced  skill  and 
diligent  celerity,  could  not  meet  the  demands  upon  it,  the  mov- 
able type  came  to  replace  it,  pushed  to  discovery  by  the  inces- 
sant desire  for  something  to  multiply,  without  ceasing  or  weary- 
ing, the  records  of  faith,  and  the  productions  of  Christian 
thought ;  and  it  was  but  appropriate  that  the  sacred  and  large 
Book  of  our  religion,  partly  by  blocks,  fully  by  separate  inter- 
changeable types,  should  be  offered  to  the  world  as  its  earliest 
gift,  by  the  novel  invention. 

The  Christian  Faith,  in  certain  austere  forms,  has  sometimes 
appeared  unfriendly  to  art.  But  art  began  to  be  cherished  in 
the  Catacombs,  by  the  church  there  imprisoned  ;  and  on  the 
walls  of  the  Callixtine  cemetery,  or  of  that  of  Domitilla,  symbolic 
paintings  are  found,  some  not  improbably  of  the  second  century: 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  23a 

ot  Moses,  smiting  the  rock  with  his  rod ;  of  the  fish,  bearing  a 
basket  of  bread ;  of  the  branching  vine ;  of  the  story  of  Jonah  ;— 
of  one  scene,  which  had  then  a  terrific  significance,  of  Elijah  as- 
cending in  his  chariot  of  fire.  The  final  glimmer  of  the  Greek 
technical  skill,  which  was  slowly  dying  long  before  in  its  en- 
forced transfer  to  Rome,  is  still  preserved  in  these  primitive 
pictures :  where  the  Good  Shepherd  replaces  the  poetic  Apollo, 
where  Orpheus  appears  as  in  some  sort  the  type  and  forerunner 
of  Christ,  where  the  crowns  and  palms  of  Olympian  games  become 
the  symbols  of  Christian  triumph,  and  the  ship,  beating  against 
turbulent  seas,  but  at  last  nearing  the  harbor-gates,  is  the  obvious 
sign  for  the  Christian  life.  Even  there  was  shown  the  subtile  and 
strong  aesthetic  tendency,  combined  with  a  consecrating  spiritual 
conviction,  whicli  afterward  broke  into  light  more  splendidly  in 
the  dexterous  camngs  and  capitals  of  E-avenna,  or  its  superb  and 
shining  mosaics ;  in  the  rude  bronze  gates  of  the  Veronese  Church 
of  San  Zenone — anticipating  those  more  famous  at  Florence ;  in 
many  features  and  ornaments  of  churches  which  have  not  ceased 
to  attract  and  charm  the  eyes  of  travellers. 

When  technical  skill  had  again  been  mastered  by  those  whose  "^ 
genius  impelled  them  to  it,  and  to  whom  leisure  gave  opportu- 
nity, and  when  Christianity  had  at  length  had  time,  amid  the 
terrific  confusions  and  destructions  of  almost  uninterrupted  war, 
to  work  the  sense  of  its  majestic  and  tender  stories,  and  of  its 
revelations  of  realms  above  sight,  into  the  general  conscious- 
ness of  peoples,  then  came  the  wonderful  new  birth  of  poetry 
and  art,  the  true  Renaissance,  in  all  southern  and  central  Eu- 
rope. We  apply  this  name,  in  a  limited  sense,  to  the  movement 
of  the  fifteenth  century  and  after,  which  took  its  impulse  from 
a  renewed  study  of  the  antique  monuments  and  life.  In  an 
equally  just  and  a  larger  sense  it  applies  to  all  that  continuing 
and  astonishing  development  of  culture  which  sprang  from 
deeper  and  broader  forces,  as  early  as  the  thirteenth  century. 
Its  prophecies,  at  least,  are  to  be  traced  in  the  more  active  polit- 
ical life,  the  acquisition  of  Latin  authors,  the  development  of 
universities,  as  well  as  in  the  beginning  of  mediaeval  art,  in  pic 
ture  and  church,  in  liturgy  and  music.  The  arts  of  design,  in 
color  or  in  marble,  came  later  to  ampler  development,  but  the 


234  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRmTIANITY 

strong  impress  of  religion  was  on  them.  Who  has  not  felt  the 
prodigious  change  which  passed  upon  painting,  and  which  left 
its  records  in  sculptured  stone,  when  a  real  rapture  or  a  real 
agony,  of  a  Person  believed  to  be  superhuman  in  essence  and  in 
relations,  began  to  take  the  place  of  the  self-conscious  fancy 
which  had  sought  to  portray  the  Juno  or  the  Diana,  the  Hercules 
or  the  Faun  ?  Freedom,  variety,  naturalness,  dignity,  a  new 
ethical  tone,  a  larger  and  sweeter  inspiration,  came  with  the  im- 
pulse of  the  new  Faith  into  the  arts  which  heathenism  had 
cherished  and  yet  had  dishonored.  The  stimulated  soul  endued 
with  fresh  grace  and  a  more  eager  force  the  animated  hand ; 
and  so,  and  not  otherwise,  were  bom  at  last  the  world's  master- 
pieces, the  Assumption  of  the  Virgin,  the  Last  Communion  of 
St.  Jerome,  the  Sistine  Madonna,  the  Transfiguration. 

Into  the  brain  of  builder  and  architect  streamed,  even  earlier, 
the  same  surpassing  and  stimulating  effluence  from  the  august 
religion  ;  and  rock  rose  as  in  modulated  psalms,  fortress  and 
palace  being  humbled  and  dwarfed  by  the  temple  for  worship, 
when  the  solid  quarry  broke  forth  before  genius  into  Gloria  and 
Te  Deum.  Certainly,  by  consent  of  all,  there  has  been  thus  far 
no  art  in  the  world  like  the  Christian  art.  Its  temples  arose  on 
a  soil  still  quaking  with  tread  of  armies,  and  hot  with  the  unex- 
tinct  fires  of  war;  and  the  singular  combination  which  the  0^  ris- 
tian  records  everywhere  present  of  the  most  minute  touches  f 
human  biography  with  the  vast,  overshadowing,  unsearchAble 
reach  of  the  realms  supernatural — of  the  Lord  who  was  a  ba  e 
in  Bethlehem,  and  afterward  Eedeemer  and  King  of  the  world 
— ^this  is  the  key  alone  sufficient,  when  applied  to  such  art,  to 
unlock  the  secret  of  its  harmonies  and  its  heights.  Eighty 
columns,  daintiest  capitals,  darkKng  shadows,  glancing  colors, 
the  gleam  of  sunshine  smiting  through  translucent  go)d,  the 
crimson  splashes  spattering  pavements,  scutcheon  and  banner 
effulgent  with  glow  of  royal  purple,  the  dome  that  seems  pnr- 
posed  to  roof  the  world — they  are  not  a  medley,  they  are  a 
marvel,  by  which  the  dullest  are  impressed ;  and  they  could  not 
have  been,  in  their  mysterious  and  astonishing  combinations,  ex- 
cept for  the  religion  which  the  timid  have  trusted,  by  which 
genius  has  been  profoundly  searched  and  supremely  exalted, 
and  from  whose  power  Christendom  has  sprung. 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  235 

Even  the  sensitive  enjoyment  of  nature  stands  connected  a1  \ 
its  root  with  the  rich  and  majestic  monotheistic  conception.  It 
has  finer  expression  in  Hebrew  literature  than  in  all  the  Greek 
or  Roman  classics.  Humboldt  notices  the  fact  that  a  single 
Psalm — the  104:th — '  represents  the  image  of  the  whole  cosmos '; 
and  Goethe  spoke  of  the  book  of  Ruth,  with  its  simple  and  "^ 
charming  pictures  of  nature,  as  '  the  loveliest  specimen  of  epic 
and  idyl  poetry  which  we  possess.'  *  The  love  of  noble  or 
gentle  landscape,  which  has  come  to  be  a  source  of  such  keen 
and  wide  pleasure  among  western  peoples  in  more  recent  times, 
is  in  harmony  with,  as  it  seems  plainly  to  have  sprung  from,  the 
picturesque  and  exalting  instructions  of  the  Gospel ;  and  noth- 
ing else  so  links  the  earth,  in  lily  and  mountain,  and  winding 
waters,  with  blooms  above  and  rivers  of  life,  as  does  the  astonish- 
ing record  of  the  Chiist.  ' 

Indeed,  to  whichever  side  we  turn,  a  similar  impulse  to  free 
and  various  mental  activity  is  always  before  us,  along  the  paths 
of  the  Christian  advance.  The  religion  which  brings  so  much  n 
of  literature,  so  much  of  history  associated  with  it,  which  pre- 
sents such  practical  yet  imperial  themes  for  human  contempla- 
tion, and  which  naturally  calls  for  such  prolonged  and  vigorous 
exercise  of  all  powers  of  the  mind,  such  a  religion  cannot  but 
send  the  intellect  forth,  equipped  and  strengthened,  into  every 
field  on  which  it  may  enter.  What  Milton  said  of  any  good 
book  may  certainly  be  said,  with  preeminent  emphasis,  of  the  book 
of  our  religion  :  "  The  precious  life-blood  of  a  master-spirit, 
embalmed  and  treasured  up  on  purpose  to  a  life  beyond  life."  f 
It  deals  with  great  principles,  and  so  stimulates  the  spirit  whose 
business  it  is  to  ascertain  and  apply  these.  It  seeks  illustra- 
tion from  every  side  of  physical  nature,  of  human  life.  It  stirs 
the  enthusiasms  which  are  as  the  fiery  heart  of  the  engine,  under 
whose  impulse  wheels  revolve,  and  ponderous  arms  play  back 
and  forth.  It  liberates  the  higher  intellectual  nature,  so  far  as 
its  influence  is  accepted,  from  binding  appetites  and  mis-inter- 
preting passions.     And  it  aflSrms,  whether  truly  or  not,  that  the 


*  "Cosmos":  London  ed.,  1870;  Yol.n.:  pp.  413,  415. 
T  Prose  Works  :  London  ed.,  1753  ;  Vol.  I. :  p.  151. 


236  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITY 

word  which  it  presents  is  in  harmony  with  God's  works,  and 
that  nothing  which  is  true  can  contradict  or  displace  it.  At 
once  tender  and  commanding,  connecting  our  little  life  on  earth 
with  life  unending  in  other  spheres,  it  challenges  alike  the  largest 
reflection  and  the  most  acute  and  unrelaxing  research  from  the 
world  of  mankind.  I  expect,  therefore,  to  find  fresh  studies 
and  sciences  springing  in  its  path,  as  flowers  and  grasses  beneath 

\  the  benignant  touch  of  spring. 

The  theologian  :  it  may  be  first  the  heart  which  makes  him,  ac- 
cording to  the  loved  maxim  of  Neander ;  but  the  discerning  and 
reconciling  brain  is  surely  as  needful,  as  has  often  been  shown,  in 
Augustine,  Anselm,  Aquinas,  in  the  English  Butler,  in  oui*  own 
Edwards,  pronounced  by  eminent  Europeans  among  the  first  of 
metaphysicians,  and  in  multitudes  of  others.  Their  whole  large 
endeavor  in  life  has  expressed,  better  than  any  words,  their  sound 
and  strong  sense  of  the  rightful  prerogative  of  the  human  mind, 
interpreting  the  ways  of  the  Almighty  to  man.  However 
sharply  they  have  censured  man's  character,  they  have  not  been 
insensible  to  the  indefeasible  magistracy  which  belongs  to  his  in- 
tellect ;  and  however  diverse  their  theories  may  have  been  of 
the  profound  philosophy  of  religion,  however  we  may  possibly 
dissent  from  all  of  them,  they  have  been  witnesses,  as  surely  none 
will  dispute,  to  the  energizing  force  which  the  Christian  scheme, 
whose  mysteries  they  have  sought  to  elucidate,  delivers  upon  the 
mind. 

So  have  been,  equally,  the  great  preachers,  from  Chrysostom 
onward — before  him,  indeed — and  in  all  regions  or  sects  of  the 
church.  There  were  none  such,  there  could  be  none,  in  the 
ethnic  religions.  Heathenism  concerned  itself  scarcely  at  all 
with  moral  teaching,  still  less  with  any  systematic  exhibition  of 

/Spiritual  truth.  But,  from  the  beginning,  Christendom  has  been 
resonant  with  earnest  teaching,  because  the  religion  which  has 
had  command  in  it  has  been  doctrinal,  historical,  preceptive  in 
its  character,  requiring  to  be  commended  to  men  by  earnest  and 
careful  intellectual  processes ;  and  the  greatest  of  these  preachers, 
whether  Catholic  or  Protestant,  have  addressed  with  their  eager 
and  quickening  thought,  and  with  the  almost  magical  force  of 
epiritual  enthusiasm,  the  humblest  minds — precisely  those  which 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  237 

the  ancient  philosophy  would  have  deemed  itself  dishonored  by 
touching. 

So  expositors  have  come,  in  numbers  almost  countless,  stu- 
dents of  the  word,  and  learned  and  lucid  interpreters  of  its  con- 
tents ;  and  libraries  have  been  gathered,  when  once  formed  they 
have  rapidly  been  enlarged,  to  supply  the  instruments  for  defin- 
ing or  expounding  the  sacred  text.  The  labor  expended  upon 
that  text,  to  assure  its  correctness,  since  the  earliest  time,  but 
especially  since  the  days  of  Erasmus,  has  made  centuries  cele- 
brated in  the  merely  literary  history  of  mankind.  It  is  a  work 
prosecuted  as  eagerly  at  this  hour  as  ever  before,  and  the  last 
thirty  years  have  only  done  more  for  it  than  many  preceding 
equal  periods. 

Historians,  too,  have  arisen,  rich  in  learning,  broad  in  survey, 
careful  in  detail,  with  minds  discerning  and  intuitive,  and  with 
the  fine  detective  insight  of  spiritual  sympathy,  to  unfold  the 
progress  of  Christianity  in  the  world  :  to  show  how  it  fought 
with  alien  powers,  and  overcame  them  in  '  the  unsubduable  might 
of  weakness ';  and  how  the  subsequent  advancing  consciousness 
of  the  ever-unfolding  Christian  society,  in  all  its  periods,  has 
found  its  various,  but  on  the  whole  its  grand  expression  ;  how 
men  and  institutions  have  illustrated  this,  and  then  have  reacted 
with  energy  upon  it ;  and  how  the  present  unseen  activity  of 
that  Lord  of  this  religion  in  whom,  as  Pascal  said,  '  all  contra- 
dictions are  reconciled,'  has  been  revealing  itself  afresh  through 
controversy  and  mission,  in  councils  and  in  cottages,  making 
individuals  its  servants  and  champions,  making  the  nations  reflect 
its  lustre. 

All  history,  to  be  vital  and  rich,  implies  that  moral  sympathy 
with  man  which  Christianity  nurtures  :  implies  the  recognition 
of  that  Divine  order  in  the  progress  of  the  world  of  which 
Christianity  alone  supplies  either  the  conditions  or  the  discov- 
ery. Max  Miiller  has  said  that  the  worship  of  the  Semitic  na- 
tions '  is  preeminently  the  worship  of  God  in  History.'  *  But 
Christ  in  History  has  been  always  the  inspiration  to  largest 
thought,  to  richest  and  most  illuminating  study,  in  Latin  or  in 


*  "  Science  of  Religion":  New  York  ed.,  1872  :  p.  62. 


238  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITT 

Gothic  Christendom.  I  conceive  that  no  grander  single  nrion-a- 
ment  was  ever  erected  to  the  comprehensive  reach  and  the  in- 
tei'preting  insight  of  the  human  intelligence — though  it  was 
meant  for  anything  but  that ! — than  the  marvellous  history  of 
the  Christian  religion  which  has  made  familiar  to  all  the  world 
the  chosen  new  name  of  Neander :  who  wrought  with  such 
prodigal  patience  and  labor,  such  intuitive  skill,  and  such  sustain- 
ing enthusiasm  of  love,  to  show  the  living  witness  in  Christen- 
dom to  the  Divine  power  of  that  religion  which  his  ancestors 
had  hated ;  whose  motto,  *  Theologia  crucis,  non  glorise,'  ex- 
pressed his  whole  spirit ;  *  of  whom  the  Roman  Catholic  theo- 
logian Moehler  said  that  he  embraced  everything,  even  the  most 
profound,  and  apportioned  to  every  man  his  place  with  undevi- 
ating  justice ;  whose  lectures  have  been  happily  described,  by 
one  who  felt  and  who  still  reproduces  both  his  diligence  and  his 
sympathy,  as  an  uninterrupted  flow  of  learning  and  thought 
from  the  deep  and  pure  fountains  of  the  inner  life  ;  and  who  at 
last,  after  almost  incredible  achievements  in  study,  simply  said, 
'  I  am  weary — ^let  us  go  home,'  and  was  carried  to  his  grave  fol- 
lowed by  thousands  of  students  and  of  citizens,  with  the  king 
among  them,  and  with  his  own  copies  of  the  Christian  scriptures 
borne  upon  his  bier.  I  match  against  his  Gibbon's  history,  or 
any  other  which  a  haughty  and  sceptical  temper  has  wrought,  and 
the  power  of  Christianity  in  inspiring  the  intellect,  as  well  as  in 
subduing  and  transforming  the  heart,  appears  to  me  beyond 
dispute. 

I  need  not  speak — I  cannot,  of  course,  in  the  mi'uutes  which 
remain — of  the  great  Christian  jurists,  who  have  surpassed,  not 
in  learning  only,  or  in  scientific  merit,  but  in  ultimate  judicial 
wisdom,  Paulus  or  Papinian,  Ulpian  or  Tribonian,  because 
following  in  their  path  with  a  nobler  juristic  spirit,  a  sweeter 
and  sounder  ethical  insight,  taught  by  Christianity  ;  nor  of  the 
authors,  various,  multitudinous,  who  in  all  forms  of  letters, 
poetry,  philosophy,  scientific  discussion,  naiTative,  romance,  have 
shown  the  force  of  inspirations  around  them,  whether  or  not  they 


*  Dr.  Schaff:  "Germany,  its  Universities,  etc."    New  York  ed.,  1857; 
p.  273. 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  239 

were  equally  witliin  them,  prompting  toiinest  and  highest  thought, 
and  giving  grander  moral  meanings  to  what  language  became 
ennobled  in  expressing  ;  nor  of  the  diligent  travelers  and  ex- 
plorers, who  have  made  the  ancient  streets  of  Jerusalem  as  evi- 
dent to  cur  thought  as  these  are  to  our  eyes  along  which  we 
familiarly  walk,  who  have  followed  each  step  of  the  Lord  in  hia 
journeys,  and  have  traced  and  mapped  the  journeys  of  his  apos- 
tles with  a  care  and  fullness  surpassing  that  of  any  Itinerary  of 
Antoninus ;  nor  of  the  inventors  who,  under  the  practical  im- 
pulse of  Christianity,  catching  its  enthusiasm  for  peaceful  arts, 
and  in  inward  accord  with  its  benign  bent,  have  put  so  many 
novel  instruments  into  the  disciplined  hands  of  men, — working 
sometimes  with  a  positive  purpose  of  consecration,  and  always 
in  an  air  electric  with  aspiration  because  quickened  by  the 
Master.  It  is  not  possible  to  even  indicate  the  forms  in  which 
the  vast  new  mental  inspiration  which  came  by  Jesus  has  been 
exhibited.  To  enumerate  and  describe  them  were  the  labor  of 
many  life-times. 

The  common  familiarity  with  many  languages  in  modern 
times  is  itself  to  be  ascribed,  in  large  measure,  to  this  religion 
which  came  out  of  Galilee.  The  mere  labor  of  translating  the 
Christian  scriptures  into  other  tongues  than  those  which  first 
held  them  has  been  continuous  and  immense.  It  has  been 
prompted  and  sustained  by  the  sense  of  the  superlative  import- 
ance of  these  scriptures,  to  persons  and  to  peoples,  and  by  the 
enthusiasm  kindled  toward  them  in  those  who  receive  them.  The 
age  which  saw  their  translation  into  the  Syriac,  the  JEthiopic,  or 
the  Gothic,  is  linked  indissolubly  by  the  sublime  labor  with  that 
which  has  witnessed  in  our  own  day  the  regeneration  of  savage 
dialects,  that  into  them  might  enter  the  word  of  him  who  spake  to 
the  world  from  Nazareth.  The  work  is  one  peculiar  to  Christianity. 
The  Koran  contemplates  no  version  of  itself  out  of  the  sacred 
Arabic  words  into  the  jargon  of  external  dialects.  Its  inspira- 
tion must  evaporate  in  the  process.  E'o  Chinaman  puts  Confu- 
cius into  English.  Even  Gibbon  remarked  that  Chinese  gram- 
mars were  written  in  Paris,  and  doubted  if  the  mandarins  knew 
their  own  language  as  well  as  the  Frenchman.*    l^o  Buddhist 

*  Misc.  Works :  London  ed.,  1796  ;  Vol.  II. :  p.  237. 


240  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRmTIANlTY 

transports  the  three  Pitakas,  or  even  the  Dhammapada,into  Ital 
ian  or  German  forms.  But  the  Gospels  and  Epistles — the  whole 
Bible,  indeed — under  the  impulse  which  inheres  in  themselveSy 
are  constantly  pushed  into  translation  by  their  disciples,  into 
every  known  or  accessible  language.  Linguistic  studies  become 
thus  each  year  more  thorough  and  wide,  in  the  lands  ruled  by 
this  religion ;  and  Christendom  is  characterized  as  the  circle  of 
nations  in  which  most  numerous  languages  find  readers.  It  is  so 
because  the  religion  which  moulds  it  comes  to  men  in  a  Book, 
and  claims  for  itself  universal  supremacy.  If  the  dialects  of 
mankind  were  once  divided  by  any  catastrophe,  it  is  certain  that 
this  reconciling  religion  means  to  make  the  sovereign  contents 
of  all  at  last  identical.  The  name  of  its  founder  is  already  at 
home  in  Oceanica  or  in  Africa,  as  it  is  in  our  churches ;  and  the 
documents  teaching  of  his  character  and  his  life  have  created 
their  own  alphabetical  forms  in  the  most  uncultured  tongues  of 
the  earth. 

Of  course  popular  education  has  been  incessantly  stimulated^ 
wherever  this  religion  has  gone,  by  the  effort  to  bring  the 
general  mind  into  immediate  and  quickening  contact  with 
the  doctrines  and  precepts  set  forth  in  its  books,  and  with 
/  the  studies  which  these  inspire.  The  Greek  education,  es- 
pecially at  Athens,  was  noble  in  its  aim,  caring  for  morals  as 
well  as  for  learning,  full  of  that  fine  paramount  instinct  of 
proportion  and  harmony  which  appears  in  all  the  greater 
Greek  work,  and  seeking  to  give  equal  and  elaborate  culture 
to  every  force  of  mind  and  body,  by  the  grammar,  music,  and 
gymnastics  associated  in  it.  Teachers  from  other  lands  were 
attracted  to  the  city  whose  intellectual  life  was  a  glory  of  the 
world.  The  grand  works  of  Hellenic  genius  were  themselves  a 
liberal  education ;  and  the  presence  of  eminent  men,  in  a  pop- 
ulation as  limited  as  that  of  Athens,  was  a  constant  stimulant  to 
all  rare  forces  of  talent  or  genius.  But  no  public  institutions 
for  education  were  erected  or  maintained  at  the  general  expense, 
though  the  age  of  tutors,  and  the  number  of  their  scholars,  were 
under  a  certain  regulation  by  law.  The  chief  object  of  edu» 
cation  was  to  make  good  citizens,  and  to  give  an  ampler  enjoy* 
ment  in  life    and  the  poor,  in  respect  to  it,  were  at  vast  disadv4iD 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.         241 

tage,  as  comparod  with  the  prosperous.  The  Roman  spirit,  more 
strict  and  imperious,  for  long  periods  of  time  limited  its  instruc- 
tion to  such  departments  as  should  conduce  most  to  military 
success  and  public  aggrandizement ;  and  Cato  only  expressed 
the  feeling  in  the  midst  of  which  he  had  grown  up  when  he 
denounced  the  philosophy  of  Greece,  and  resisted  the  sudden 
passion  for  it  on  the  part  of  the  young.  He  no  doubt  felt  at  the 
time,  as  he  said,  that  the  state  would  perish,  if  it  should  come 
to  be  infected  with  the  Greek  literature.  In  the  great  days  of 
Rome  only  agriculture  and  war  were  held  in  general  esteem, 
and  literary  employments  were  largely  left  to  the  servile  class. 
Even  in  the  imperial  time,  the  preceptor  and  the  pedagogue,  the 
reader  and  the  scribe,  the  clerk,  the  singer,  and  the  keeper  ( f 
the  books,  were  commonly  slaves.  And  though  within  the 
century  .and  a  half  after  the  capture  of  Corinth,  to  the  time  of 
Augustus,  the  eminent  Greek  authors  had  come  to  be  familiar 
at  Rome,  and  Latin  literature  had  attained  a  brief  and  splendid 
consummation,  in  which  the  language  was  enriched,  while  poetry, 
history,  philosophy,  jurisprudence,  in  eminent  instances  the  nat- 
ural sciences,  were  carefully  cultivated,  the  period  was  short,  the 
decline  was  inevitable,  because  there  were  no  towering  truths 
behind  these  liberal  arts  and  'fair  humanities.'  Contests  of  rhe- 
torical skill,  public  recitals,  were  adopted  from  the  Greeks,  and 
literary  feasts  became  a  temporary  fashion.  But  the  system  of 
education  had  then  for  its  end  the  adding  more  of  luxury  to 
life,  as  it  had  before  had  it  for  its  special  purpose  to  fit  men  more 
perfectly  for  the  haughty  game  of  politics  and  of  war.  It  was 
closely  limited,  also,  to  the  wealthier  classes. 

Christianity  alone,  with  instinctive  impulse,  seeks  to  quicken  \ 
and  expand  the  minds  of  the  humblest,  that  they  may  apprehend 
what  she  affirms  to  be  truths  of  the  universe,  and  may  be  lifted 
to  contemplate  His  incomparable  plans  on  the  word  of  whose 
power  the  worlds  are  hung.  It  is  at  least  a  great  aspiration. 
We  see  its  efifect  in  the  millions  of  schools  with  which  continents 
are  alive,  and  in  which  are  laid  the  sure  foundations  of  the 
world's  ultimate  civilization.  These  are  not  special  to  our  times. 
They  had  their  origin  far  back,  in  the  depths  of  the  darkness 
which  followed  the  crash  of  the  Western  Empire.  Before  that, 
16 


212  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

indeed,  they  bad  already  begun  to  be  established  ;  and  the  forcef 
manifested  in  their  erection  have  never  since  failed  in  Christian 
communities.  It  is  noticeable,  too,  that  wherever  such  schools 
have  once  been  established,  their  tendency  has  been  to  enlarge- 
ment and  expansion,  under  Christianity ;  till  the  "  Schola  "  has 
become  as  of  course  the  "  TJuiversitas,"  and  that  which  started 
with  teaching  men  only  the  contents  of  the  Scripture,  and  the 
general  laws  of  Christian  living,  has  gone  back  over  history,  haa 
gone  abroad  over  nature,  has  pierced  the  rocks  and  searched 
the  suns,  has  taken  learning  from  all  languages,  and  discipline 
from  all  acute  dialectics,  and  has  gathered  in  its  enormous  libra- 
ries the  aggregate  treasures  of  the  mind  of  the  world. 

So  the  University  of  Paris  grew  up  from  the  theological  teacb- 
ings  of  William  of  Champeaux,  of  Ab^lard,  and  of  Peter  Lom- 
bard ;  the  Universities  of  Cambridge  and  Oxford  from  obscure 
conventual  schools.  And  whereas  the  famous  Arabic  seminaries 
in  Spain,  of  the  mediaeval  period,  teaching  a  religion  of  dominating 
will  and  predestinating  force,  have  left  no  successors,  and  have 
to-day  no  vital  relation  to  the  mind  of  the  world,  these  Christian 
universities,  springing  up  as  by  magic  all  over  the  continent,  are 
as  sure  of  continuance  as  are  the  cities  and  countries  which  they 
make  famous,  and  are  being  reproduced  on  our  recent  shores. 
The  university,  as  truly  as  chapel  or  cathedral,  is  the  offspring 
of  the  Faith  which  was  preached  in  Judea.  Hadrian  planted 
one,  after  his  fashion,  amid  the  opulence  of  Kome.  It  was  like 
his  attempt  to  represent  the  majestic  or  delightful  sceneries  of 
countries  at  his  Yilla  at  Tivoli;  a  supei-iicial  attempt,  which 
scarcely  survived  his  own  frail  life.  Our  Fathers  started  one  in 
their  utmost  poverty,  on  shores  barren  of  beauty,  and  under  a 
sky  black  with  tempests,  and  we  know  to  what  already  it  has 
grown  ;  how  many  others  have  taken  from  it  impulse,  instruc- 
tion, and  large  aspiration. 

With  one  swift  glance,  then,  notice  the  contrast  of  other  re- 
ligions, even  those  which  at  first  seem  most  intellectual.  There 
have  been,  as  I  have  said,  Sacred  Books  beside  the  Christian  :  the 
Hindu  Yedas,  Brahmanas,  Upanishads,  Sutras ;  the  Buddhist  Pita- 
kas,Yinaya,  Sutta,  and  Abhidhamma ;  the  Chinese  books ;  the  Per- 
sian  Avesta,  the  Koran.   These  have  been  made  familiar  in  Chris* 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  2-13 

tendom  by  the  labor  of  Christian  scholars,  often  of  devout  Chris, 
tian  missionaries ;  and  it  is  a  point  of  honor  to-day,  among  these  ^ 
scholars,  to  find  in  snch  books  whatever  can  be  anywhere  discov, 
ered  of  wisdom,  beauty,  and  moral  force.  Undoubtedly  there 
is  much  ;  for  the  Light  which  lighteth  every  man  that  cometh 
into  the  world  was  not  left  without  witness  in  the  often  high 
and  sensitive  spirits  from  which  they  came.  Religions  differ 
more  widely  in  their  principles  than  in  the  particular  precepts 
which  they  inculcate ;  and  the  precepts  may  seem  in  formal 
agreement,  while  the  effects  of  the  systems  with  which  they  are 
connected  shall  be  wholly  diverse — as  the  same  botanical  order  ^ 
which  embraces  the  deadly  night-shade  embraces  plants  nutri- 
tious and  tonic.  So  a  Roman  Catholic  Bishop  has  affirmed  that 
Buddhism  teaches  in  its  scriptures  '  a  surprising  number  of  the 
finest  precepts  and  purest  moral  truths,'  *  though  the  peculiar  re- 
ligion of  those  books  culminates,  he  affirms,  in  atheism  and  ni- 
hilism. But  laying  aside  all  special  comparisons,  what  have 
these  religions  done,  either  or  all,  for  the  general,  liberal,  and 
progressive  education  of  the  ardent,  ingenious,  and  capable  peo- 
ples, among  whom  they  had  ancient  place,  and  have  had  since 
continued  power?  What  strong,  steady,  effective  impulse  has 
gone  from  them  into  the  recipient  public  mind  ?  What  sciences, 
arts,  poetries,  have  sprung  from  them,  which  the  world  at  large 
will  not  surrender  ?  Of  what  beneficent  and  fruitful  civilizations 
have  they  been  the  un wasting  source  ? 

I  think  of  Hindustan,  inhabited  for  ages  by  our  own  kindred, 
whose  ornaments  were  sought  by  Solomon  for  his  palace,  whose 
gold  brocades  were  in  the  courts  of  imperial  Rome,  whose 
poetry,  ante-dating  the  Christian  era,  is  still  read  and  admired  in 
Europe — without  present  science,  history,  poetry,  or  any  recent 
mechanical  arts,  except  as  these  have  pressed  in  from  abroad , 
with  no  geography,  even,  of  native  production,  and  no  philosophy 
which  asserts  itself  valid  to  the  mind  of  the  world ;  constrained 
to  import  its  very  arguments  against  the  religion  of  the  New 
Testament  from  the  countries  in  which  men  have  been  stimu- 
lated and  trained  by  that  reHgion  : — I  think  of  China,  where  it 
is  said  that  the  seat   of  the  understanding  is  assigned  to  the 

*  Bp.Bigandet:  "  Legend  of  Gaudama";  (Preface).     London  ed.,  1880. 


24A  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRmTIANITY 

stomach,  but  where  respect  for  learning  is  ahnost  a  religion,  and 
where  the  assiduous  cultivation  of  such  learning  is  the  pride  oi 
the  people,  and  the  glory  of  the  throne — without  epic  or  art, 
with  the  old-time  classics  still  in  their  place,  but  with  no  living 
literature  to  enlighten  and  discipline  the  mind  of  the  people ; 
whatever  they  attain  marked,  as  Frederick  Schlegel  said,  '  with 
unnatural  stiffness,  childish  vanity,  exaggerated  refinement,  in 
the  most  important  provinces  of  thought,  and  the  language  itself 
chiefly  characterized  by  jejuneness  and  poverty  ';^ — and  then  I 
turn  to  the  lands  which  Christianity  has  filled  with  its  scriptures, 
and  with  their  unwasting  indefinable  impulse,  and  how  vast  ia 
the  contrast ! 

No  matter,  now,  by  whom  or  when  these  scriptures  were 
written  ;  how  far  they  deserve  the  faith  which  they  challenge 
from  the  mind  of  mankind.  No  student  of  the  past  can  dispute 
their  enduring  and  astonishing  effects  on  the  minds,  not  of  per- 
sons only,  but  of  peoples. 

I  see  the  rough  and  savage  strain  of  Gothic,  Slavic^  Turanian 
blood,  pouring  upon  the  Roman  Empire,  apparently  insuscepti- 
ble to  culture,  and  ruthlessly  destructive  of  al!  ancient  monu- 
ments ;  I  see  the  ages  of  what  seemed  a  hopeless  disorder  follow- 
ing, when  learning  must  hide  itself  in  convent  or  palace  to  keep 
itself  alive,  when  languages  themselves  went  out  of  existence, 
when  the  naked  sabre,  which  the  Alani  are  said  to  have  worship- 
ped, with  its  hilt  in  the  earth  and  its  point  toward  heaven,  ap- 
peared the  only  worthy  symbol  of  the  forces  which  presided  in 
the  barbaric  chaos  : — and  then  I  trace  the  grip  and  scope  of  this 
most  spiritual  but  most  masterful  religion  which  comes  to  its 
fullness  in  the  New  Testament ;  I  see  its  ministers  compelled  to 
know  something  of  history,  ethics,  the  thought  of  the  past,  as 
well  as  of  rubrics  and  of  tithes ;  I  see  its  cloisters  coming  to  be 
crowded  with  diligent  writers,  until  the  presses  take  their  place ; 
I  see  languages  reduced  to  order  and  form  that  they  may  receive 
the  immortal  evangel ;  I  see  schools  and  universities  rising  be- 
fore it,  education  expanding,  no  learning  discredited,  all  forms 
of  true  knowledge  at  last  welcomed  and  honored — till  the  entire 
^ir  of  society  is  full  of  subtile  intellectual  stimulation,  till  the 

*"  Philosophy  of  History  "  :  New  York  ed.,  1841,  Vol.  I. :  p.  155. 


ON  THE  MENTAL  CULTURE  OF  MANKIND.  2dt5^ 

new  ages  rise  into  the  manifold  fullness  of  light  in  which  we 
are  embosomed,  till  the  more  inviting  realms  of  the  world,  ear- 
lier in  their  culture,  now  turn  to  Christendom  as  having  in  that 
their  only  hope  for  even  a  secondary  mental  progress ;  I  see  the 
great  discoveries  coming  in  this  circle  of  nations  which  bar 
barism  so  lately  ruled,  to  enrich  and  empower  human  society; 
I  hear  there  the  poems,  tender  or  triumphing,  which  are  the  tim- 
brels and  the  trumpets  to  which  the  race  is  marching  forward  ;  1 
see  the  ages  of  intelligent  faith  fruitful  and  quickening,  while 
those  of  unbelief  are  barren  in  contrast ;  I  see  the  vast  amphi- 
theatre filled  with  the  light  of  the  Book,  as  Raphael's  picture  of 
Peter  in  prison  with  the  light  of  the  angel,  subduing  the  light  of 
torch  or  of  moon  : — and  I  say  with  absolute  certainty,  for  myself, 
that  the  power  here  shown  is  liJce  a  power  coming  for  the  race, 
and  coming  from  God ! 

Whatever  else  is  true  or  not,  the  superlative  educational  force  ^ 
of  the  world  appears  embodied  in  this  system  of  Faith  which 
came  by  peasants  as  its  ministers,  and  the  son  of  a  carpenter  as 
its  mysterious  sovereign  Teacher.  It  lays  its  hand  of  supreme 
benediction  on  countries  and  centuries  at  the  furthest  remove 
from  its  first  proclamation.  It  furnishes  the  matrix  out  of  which 
genius  may  be  expected  plenteously  to  spring.  And  sceptics 
themselves,  with  whatever  learning,  eloquence,  or  wit,  appear  to 
me  but  involuntary  witnesses  to  the  underlying  and  impenetrat- 
ing impulse  of  this  religion,  which  has  given  possibility  to  evcB 
their  hostile  culture  and  force.  ^ 


LECTURE    VIII. 


THE  EFFECT  OF  CHKISTIANITY  ON  THE  MORAL 
LIFE  OF  MANKIND. 


LECTUKE  VIIL 

The  picture  of  the  moral  life  of  antiquity  at  the  time  when 
Christinnitj  presented  its  imperative  commands  to  the  world — 
of  that  life  as  exhibited  not  in  remote  and  uncivihzed  districts, 
exceptional  in  barbarous  wickedness,  but  in  the  chief  centres  of 
culture  and  of  commerce — this  is  presented,  in  rapid  and  inci- 
dental touches,  but  yet  with  precise  and  impressive  distinctness, 
in  the  letters  of  St.  Paul ;  and  probably  no  one  will  be  tempted 
to  regard  his  portraiture  of  it  as  fanciful  or  unjust.  He  was  no 
scholastic  recluse,  brought  suddenly  face  to  face  with  the  actual 
spirit  and  conduct  of  mankind.  He  was  a  man  of  robust  nature, 
experienced  in  affairs,  conversant  with  the  customs  of  different 
peoples,  by  no  means  insensible  to  the  manifold  elements  of 
grace  and  of  grandeur  in  the  ancient  civilizations  :  a  man  of 
clear-sighted  practical  sense,  who  was  prompt  to  recognize  each 
point  of  support  for  the  religion  which  he  preached  in  the  his- 
tory, the  letters,  or  the  moral  education,  of  those  whom  he  ad- 
dressed ;  who  was  even  regarded  by  some  fastidious  disciples  as 
ready  to  intei-pret  Christianity  too  largely,  and  to  be  too  tolerant 
of  the  errors  of  his  hearers,  that  he  might  fulfil  more  completely 
his  vast  and  fruitful  mission  to  the  Gentiles. 

What  this  observant  and  practiced  man,  of  keen  intelligence, 
large  experience,  and  wide  observation,  incidentally  or  directly 
tells  us  of  those  whose  acceptance  of  the  Faith  which  he  taught 
he  is  eager  to  win,  we  may  without  demur  accept.  At  least  we 
may  be  sure  that  he  has  not  forgotten  his  own  common-sense  so 
far  as  to  outrage  the  hearts  of  his  readers,  and  to  instantly  repulse 
their  judgment,  by  painting  themselves,  or  society  around  them, 
in  colors  too  sombre.  Read  then,  in  the  light  of  this,  his  un- 
questioned letters  to  the  Corinthians,  who  had  been  withdrawn; 

(249) 


250  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

largely  tlirougli  the  influence  of  his  eager  eloquence,  from  the 
vices  of  the  heathenism  in  which  most  of  them  had  been  trained, 
and  see  in  that  vivid  ancient  silhouette  how  fierce  and  flagrant 
the  old  wickedness  was  ! 

Kemember  that  Corinth  was  at  that  time  an  intellectual  cap- 
ital of  Greece,  as  well  as  its  dependent  political  centre  ;  that  in 
it  stood  the  grandest  temples  of  that  luxurious  and  decorated 
order  which  had  taken  its  name  from  the  famous  city ;  that  the 
Isthmian  games  were  there  still  celebrated ;  and  that  not  only  par- 
ticular schools,  or  eminent  teachers,  had  distinction  in  and  around 
it,  but  the  city  itself  was  renowned  in  the  world  for  its  polished 
learning,  and  its  cultivated  fondness  for  instruction  and  research. 
Among  those,  then,  in  this  city,  who  have  distinctly,  with  revo 
lutionary  action,  come  out  from  the  defilements,  whatever  they 
may  have  been,  of  ancestral  religions,  what  is  the  present  moral 
attainment  ?  how  much,  if  anything,  of  the  earlier  dross  still 
clings  to  the  very  image  of  the  Lord,  as  formed  amid  the  heats 
of  conviction  and  consecration  in  their  softened  and  stimulated 
souls  ?  what  indications  are  thus  given  of  the  previous  character 
of  their  custom  and  spirit  ? 

I  need  not  remind  you  what  witness  is  borne,  or  with  what 
emphasis  it  is  borne,  on  either  of  these  points,  by  the  earliest  of 
these  letters.  The  old  sensuality,  which  had  in  other  times  had 
religious  consecration  by  its  intimate  connection  with  the  tem- 
ple-rites of  Aphrodite,  had  so  infected  the  nature  of  the  converts 
that  Christ  himself,  the  Lord  of  purity,  had  not  wholly  deliv- 
ered them  from  it.  Profligacy  was  defended,  on  the  ground  of 
Christian  liberty.  The  orgiastic  feasts  of  the  heathen  still  drew 
to  themselves  Christian  disciples,  in  temples  defiled  with  every 
lust.  The  solemn  and  pathetic  Supper  of  the  Lord  was  degraded 
into  a  drunken  carousal,  or  at  best  a  secular  feast.  The  spirit 
of  faction  raged  with  such  violence  as  to  despoil  worship  of  sig- 
nificance and  of  order.  Finally,  a  man  who  had  done  what  pa- 
ganism itself  could  not  but  reprobate,  in  contracting  an  incestu- 
ous marriage,  was  tolerated  in  the  Christian  society,  and  had  the 
passionate  support  of  many  of  its  members. 

These  facts  are  not  recited  by  the  apostle  as  thmgs  alleged,  of 
which  proof  may  be  needed.     They  are  referred  to  as  familiarly 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  251 

known,  as  constituting  the  very  occasion  of  his  writing  from  the 
distant  Ephesus,  amid  the  fertile  Asian  meadows ;  and  his  sec- 
ond letter  shows  the  fear  which  he  had  had  lest  his  rebuke  should 
prove  ineffective.  The  question  then  inevitably  comes  :  '  If  thia 
were  the  condition  of  those  who  had  actively  come  out  from 
heathenism,  because  a  something  higher  in  their  nature  had  been 
reached  by  the  startling  appeals  of  Christianity,  what  must  have 
been  the  preceding  life  from  which  they  had  emerged  ?  what 
must  have  continued  to  be  the  life  of  those  who  clung  with  un- 
shaken tenacity  to  the  ancient  cultus,  and  to  the  attractive  and 
canonized  vices  which  it  sanctioned  and  garnished  ? '  The  an- 
swer to  these  questions  involves  the  whole  ternfic  story  of  an- 
cient manners. 

But  if  we  wish  this  set  before  us,  not  incidentally,  but  in  a 
definite  face  to  face  portrait,  we  tura  of  course  to  the  letter  to 
the  Komans,  and  read  again  the  awful  words  in  which  the 
Bpostle,  in  the  first  three  chapters,  but  especially  in  the  first,  de- 
picts, as  with  pencil  tipped  with  fire,  the  terrible  scene  on  which 
he  looked.  The  simplicity  and  thorough  fidelity  to  truth  in  his 
lurid  delineations  would  scarcely  impress  us  as  they  ought — these 
would  surely,  I  think,  seem  over-charged — if  the  parallel  ac- 
counts of  secular  historians  did  not  sustain  them  ;  did  not  add, 
indeed,  emphatic  illustration  to  each  principal  point  in  his  sad 
and  stern  indictment.  This  was  what  the  old  civilization  had 
come  to,  in  its  ultimate  fruitage  !  Here  was  the  result  of  what 
philosophy  had  inculcated,  of  what  religion  had  enjoined,  of 
what  art,  commerce,  and  government  had  done,  to  restrain  and 
refine,  to  ennoble  and  invigorate  the  nature  of  man.  Let  us 
draw  near,  and  see  what  it  is,  this  ancient  life :  not  now  as  de- 
picted by  Paul,  but  as  illustrated  by  the  men  themselves  born  in 
it,  and  who  could  not  be  its  unfriendly  critics ;  by  men  who  no 
more  thought  at  the  time  of  the  apostle,  or  for  many  years  after, 
of  coming  out  from  it,  through  the  acceptance  of  any  new  Faith, 
than  they  thought  of  jumping  from  the  planet.  Let  Seneca, 
Tacitus,  Suetonius,  and  the  others,  be  our  teachers.  Then  we 
may  see,  through  their  eyes,  in  a  measure  at  least,  what  was  tha 
festering  and  feculent  morass,  poisonous,  malefic,  rank  with  cor- 
ruption, into  which  the  new  religion  burst,  and  through  which 


252  THE  EFFECT  OF   CHRISTIANITY 

it  poared  its  sudden  current  of  quickening  and  transforuiing  life 
If  it  did  not  wholly  purify,  it  at  least  did  something  toward 
sweetening  and  cleansing,  the  foul  habit  of  society.  And  if  it 
was  the  teaching  of  a  mere  Jewish  peasant  which  accomplished 
this  eflPect,  it  is  surely  the  most  remarkable  phenomenon  in  the 
moral  history  of  mankind. 

The  Eoman  nature,  it  must  be  remembered,  if  hard  and 
coarse  in  comparison  with  the  Greek,  was  also  relatively  vigor- 
ous and  simple.  It  had  more  of  self-restraint,  and  of  moral  vigi- 
lance. Less  picturesque,  it  was  more  practical,  resolute,  and 
robust ;  less  addicted  to  delicate  thought,  it  was  more  devoted  to 
public  affairs,  and  to  the  justice  which  guarantees  welfare.  In 
a  measure  this  moral  tendency  survived,  through  changes  oi 
manners  and  vicissitudes  of  history  ;  so  that,  down  to  the  last, 
there  were  those  in  Kome  who  amid  the  pageants  of  imperial 
pomp  delighted  to  recall  the  time  when  the  founders  of  the  Re- 
public had  dressed  in  rough  raiment,  and  had  taken  counsel,  not 
under  marble  porticoes  and  roofs,  but  in  green  meadows,  beneath 
the  open  and  lucid  heavens ;  or  when  one  who  had  been 
twice  a  consul,  as  Augustine  long  after  was  glad  to  remember, 
had  been  expelled  from  the  Senate  by  the  Censor,  for  undue 
luxury,  because  he  was  found  to  possess  ten  pounds  weight 
of  silver-ware.*  The  reed-thatched  hut  of  Romulus,  or  what 
passed  for  such,  was  still  preserved  on  the  Palatine  hill,  while 
gorgeous  structures  rose  around  it ;  and  Augustus  himself  had 
only  bought  there  the  house  of  Ilortensius,  and  lived  in  a  sim- 
ple and  manly  dignity.  There  was  no  very  sensitive  instinct 
of  righteousness  in  the  empire.  The  Latin  "  conscientia  "  had 
not  meant  what  we  call  the  moral  sense,  until  a  late  ])eriod,  any 
more  than  had  the  Greek  "  suneidesis."  Each  represented,, 
primarily,  only  conscious  intelligence  of  anything.  But  the 
patriotic  virtues  were  naturally  in  high  estimation  in  Rome. 
The  ideal  of  character,  in  the  day  of  Cato  or  of  Cicero,  was 
caught  from  the  hardy  Stoical  conception.  Indeed,  the  domi- 
nant tone  of  philosophical  thought  in  the  imperial  city,  when 
Christianity  first  was  preached  there,  was  peculiarly  Stoical ;  and 
the  doctrines  and  precepts  of  Zeno  and  Cleanthes  had  an  accept 

♦  "Civit.  Dei";  V.:  18. 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  253 

ance  among  the  stalwart  and  self-contained  Romans  widei*  and 
readier  than  they  ever  had  reached  among  the  vivacious  and 
pleasure-loving  Greeks.  There  was  to  the  end  a  ^  paitj  oi 
virtue,'  represented  by  Burrhus,  Helvidius,  Priscus,  Thrasea 
and  others,  represented  in  his  writings  most  memorably  by 
Seneca,  which  resisted  and  would  restrain  the  fierce  currents  oi 
profligacy,  swift  and  swelling,  amid  which  they  stood. 

Seneca  wrote  in  a  strain  so  lofty,  so  morally  wise,  so  nearly 
Christian,  that  it  was  afterward  commonly  thought,  as  I  have  in- 
timated before,  that  he  must  have  gathered  his  maxims  from  the 
Scriptures,  and  have  had  correspondence  with  St.  Paul.  Some 
of  the  illustrious  Christian  Fathers,  as  Tertullian,  Lactantius,  St. 
Augustine,  quote  his  words  with  approbation.  Jerome  speaks 
of  him  as  '  our  own  Seneca.'  *  He  is  said  to  have  been  quoted, 
as  one  of  the  Fathers,  at  the  Council  of  Trent.  He  was  cer- 
tainly so  referred  to  in  the  Council  of  Tours,  in  the  sixth  cen- 
tury. And  whoever  carefully  reads  the  precepts,  of  which  ho 
presents  so  many,  so  tersely,  will  be  often  surprised  at  their 
almost  verbal  agreement  wdth  the  IS'ew  Testament.  The  natural 
impression  certainly  is  of  one  who  had  heard,  from  slaves  or 
others.  Christian  teachings.  So  Cicero  declared  that  no  one  had 
attained  the  true  philosophy  who  had  not  learned  that  all  wick- 
edness should  be  shunned,  though  hidden  from  the  eyes  of  goda 
and  men  ;  and  the  younger  Pliny,  in  his  subsequent  time,  eulo- 
gized a  friend  as  one  who  did  nothing  for  exhibition,  all  for  con- 
science' sake,  seeking  the  reward  of  virtue  in  itself,  not  at  all  in 
the  praise  of  men.  He  teaches  the  duty  of  forbearance  and  for- 
giveness  ;  as  Cicero  had  recognized  the  beauty  of  humanity,  and 
forbidden  the  severe  resenting  of  injuries.  Even  Horace,  the 
practiced  and  dainty  man  of  society,  describes,  you  remember^ 
the  just  and  steadfast  man,  with  his  firm  mind  undaunted  amid 
the  crash  of  worlds,  and  calls  him  alone  happy,  not  who  possesses 
much,  but  who  knows  how  to  use  the  gifts  of  the  gods,  who  can 
suffer  poverty  with  patience,  who  dreads  a  wrong  deed  more 
than  death,  who  would  die  without  fear  for  friends  or  country. j 


*  "Noster  Seneca"  :  Adv.  Jovin.  I.:  30. 

+  L.  III. :  Car.  3  :  1-7.     L.  IV. :  Car.  9  :  45-52. 


254  THE  EFFECT  OF   CHRISTIANITY 

The  subsequent  teaching  of  Plutarch,  that  virtue  is  the  health  oi 
the  soul — answering  to  the  earlier  teacliing  of  Plato,  that  justice 
is  in  the  mind  what  ph^'sical  health  and  strength  are  in  the  body, 
and  that  injustice  is  analogous  to  sickness  and  impotence — this 
was  in  perfect  harmony  with  the  teachings  which  were  honored 
at  Rome  by  the  elect  spirits  at  the  time  when  the  "first  Christian 
congregations  hid  in  the  shadows  of  lanes  or  of  catacombs.  Phi- 
losophy, in  fact,  was  fast  becoming  absorbed  in  ethics.  The 
house-philosopher,  to  train  in  virtue,  became  an  attendant  on  a 
family  of  wealth  as  commonly  as  the  slave-physician  ;  and,  at  the 
last,  philosophical  lectures  were  almost  as  prominent  in  Roman 
society  as  th-ey  have  been  in  any  later  community,  while  the 
cynics — *  the  monks  of  Stoicism,'  as  they  have  been  called — per- 
vaded the  empire,  in  evident  rags,  and  in  presumed  wisdom. 

It  was  not,  therefore,  by  reason  of  any  peculiar  rottenness  of 
nature  that  Roman  civilization  had  come  to  be  what  it  certainly 
was  in  the  day  of  St.  Paul,  nor  by  reason  of  any  want  of  such 
precepts  and  rules,  and  moral  incentives,  tending  toward  virtue, 
as  philosophy  could  supply.  Yet  what  had  that  civilization  be- 
come, in  the  moral  habit  of  the  society  which  it  trained,  and  in 
spite  of  all  elaborate  and  strenuous  conservative  forces?  We 
know  what  the  only  answer  is,  though  one  naturally  shrinks  from 
telling  the  story. 

The  gluttony  practiced,  and  the  fantastic  indulgence  of  appe- 
tite, were  simply  staggering  to  the  modern  imagination.  Juve- 
nal might  well  say  that  men  devoured  patrimonies  at  a  meal."'^ 
ISTot  only  were  hundreds  of  dollars  sometimes  paid  for  a  fish ; 
dishes  were  served  of  the  brains  of  peacocks,  and  of  nightingales' 
tongues.  All  regions  were  ransacked  for  strange  luxuries  for 
the  table.  Yitellius  was  credited  in  the  rumor  of  his  time  with 
having  consumed  between  thirty  and  forty  millions  of  dollars  in 
our  money,  in  eating  and  entertaining,  in  about  seven  months. 
Apicius  was  said  to  have  dissolved  pearls  in  his  wine,  to  make  it 
more  costly ;  and  he  is  also  said  by  Seneca  to  have  killed  himself, 
after  consuming  in  eating  an  immense  property,  together  with 


*Sat  I.:  138. 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  255 

revenues,  and  presents  of  princes,  because  he  was  afraid  that, 
Laving  only  $400,000  left,  he  should  die  of  hunger.*  Seneca 
wrote :  *  You  may  not  wonder  that  diseases  are  numberless :  count 
the  cooks !  All  study  is  at  an  end.  There  is  solitude  in  the  schools 
of  rhetoric  and  philosophy  ;  but  how  famous  are  the  kitchens !  ^ 
Buffoons,  and  dancing  girls,  attended  on  the  feasts.  They  closed 
in  the  most  licentious  revelry ;  and  whoever  would  have  the  image 
of  one  of  them  distinctly  before  him  may  find  it  in  the  fearful 
picture  by  Couture  of  the  Eoman  Decadence,  still,  I  think,  in 
the  gallery  of  the  Luxembourg,  and  reproduced  in  occasional 
prints. 

But  gluttony,  or  eccentric  extravagance  at  the  table,  was  a 
rice  so  feeble  in  comparison  with  others  that  it  might  have 
passed  almost  without  notice.  The  iiercer  and  fouler  sensual 
passions  associated  with  it  made  simple  gluttony  nearly  respect- 
able. In  the  thirst  for  incessant  change  and  zest  of  licentious 
pleasures  marriage  was  despised,  and  was  so  often  avoided  that 
Augustus  sought  to  arrest  the  tendency,  destructive  to  the  state, 
by  imposing  taxes  and  pecuniary  disabilities  on  those  unmarried. 
Yet  the  marriage-bonds  were  as  easy  to  be  loosed  as  they  were 
tardy  in  being  assumed.  A  form  of  marriage  became  common 
whose  sanctions  were  so  slight  that  divorce  was  easy,  on  any  im- 
pulse :  so  that  Seneca  could  speak  of  the  women  who  reckoned 
the  years  by  the  number  of  their  husbands ;  and  Juvenal,  of  those 
who  were  divorced  before  the  nuptial  garlands  had  faded,  and 
whose  chief  distinction  it  was  to  have  had  eight  husbands  in  five 
autumns ;  while  Martial  founds  one  of  his  epigrams  on  the 
almost  incredible  story  of  one  who  had  married  within  a 
month  her  tenth  husband.  Even  Martial  himself,  who  was 
Certainly  troubled  with  few  scruples,  had  to  speak  of  her 
as  an  outright  adulteress,  under  cover  of  the  law,  and  to 
confess  that  an  undisguised  prostitute  would  be  to  him  less 
offensive.  Men  married  dissolute  women  for  the  purpose  of 
divorcing  them,  while  securing  the  dowry  which  would  be  for- 
feited by  their  un chastity.     Wives  were  even  interchanged  be. 


*  Consol.  ad  Helv.  X. 


256  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHBISTIANITY 

tween  friends.  The  punctilious  Marcus  Cato,  of  Caesar's  time, 
gave  his  wife  to  Hortensius,  himself  assisting  at  the  marriage, 
and,  after  the  death  of  the  latter,  married  her  again  as  a  wealthj 
widow ;  Vv'hile  Plutarch  only  intimates  that  it  might  be  a  subject 
for  discussion  whether  he  did  quite  right  in  the  matter.* 
Women  of  high  rank  even  sought  to  be  enrolled  as  commoi* 
prostitutes,  that  they  might  be  unhindered  in  their  lusts.  The  very 
temples  became  the  resorts  of  lust.  Minucius  Felix  indicates  that 
in  his  time  the  chambers  of  the  temple-keepers  saw  more  licen- 
tiousness than  the  brothels  themselves ;  and  such  enormous  ex- 
cesses of  sensuality  were  familiar  in  life  as  had  had  no  precedent, 
as  have  had — thank  God  ! — no  repetition.  The  gods  themselvea 
were  appealed  to  as  supreme  examples  of  licentious  appetite, 
giving  authority  to  the  like  among  men  ;  and  many  wlio  loved 
their  wives  and  daughters  might  have  repeated  the  outcry  said 
by  Plutarch  to  have  been  made  by  a  spectator  in  the  Atlienian 
theatre,  after  a  song  in  honor  of  Diana  :  '  May  you  be  cursed 
with  adaugliter  like  her'  !  No  frightfuUest  periods  of  licentious- 
ness in  Europe,  in  profligate  courts,  or  in  loose  and  promiscuous 
sea-faring  populations,  have  approached  in  utter  and  shameless 
^sensuality  the  period  of  the  empire  when  the  new  religion,  by 
apostle,  evangelist,  and  devoted  disciple,  began  to  be  preached 
in  it.  The  records  of  the  Court  of  Catharine  Second,  or  the 
Kussian  Elizabeth — one  might  almost  say  of  the  Papal  Court  of 
Alexander  Sixth — would  look  nearly  white  beside  the  memorials 
of  the  wives  of  Claudius.  The  very  climax  would  seem  to  have 
been  reached  when  Hadrian  built  a  city,  erected  temples,  set  up 
statues,  and  instituted  games,  in  honor  of  Antinous,  for  whom 
he  was  generally  reputed  to  have  had  an  unnatural  passion  ; 
when  a  star  was  named  for  him,  and  he  was  enrolled  among  the 
gods. 

Meantime,  of  course,  home-life,  as  it  had  existed,  among  larg« 
classes  ceased  to  be ;  and  most  distinctly  among  those  who  had 
seemed  most  fortunately  placed.  The  magnificent  mansions, 
built  and  furnished  at  a  cost  which  strikes  modern  lavishness 
dumb — filled  with  bronzes,  mosaics,  costliest  marbles,  Babylonian 


♦Lives:  «  Cato  the  Younger":  Boston  ed.,  1859,  Vol.  IV.:  pp.  395,  42a 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  257 

tapestries,  carved  ivories,  chairs  and  couches  of  ebony  and  pearl, 
ornaments  of  gold,  vessels  of  amber,  murrhiue  vases,  Alexan- 
drian glass,  wanton  pictures — these  were  not  for  domestic  pleas- 
ure, or  for  individual  study  or  labor,  but  for  ostentation,  and  the 
fullest  indulgence  of  ambition  or  lust.  Slaves  were  ready  for 
any  service,  however  detestable,  or  however  atrocious ;  and  the 
most  extravagant  expedients  were  adopted  to  give  some  relish 
of  vivacity  and  distinction  to  the  sated  and  monotonous  life  of 
luxury :  as  when  Kero's  Fopp83a  led  about  a  train  of  asses  in 
foal  whose  milk  should  give  her  cosmetic  baths,  and  had  the 
mules  drawing  her  carriage  shod  with  gold.  All  life  with  the 
wealthier  had  become  a  glaring  show  and  revel.  The  men  of 
moral  feeling,  of  intellectual  desires,  or  of  a  generous  public 
spirit,  of  whom  there  were  still  many  in  Kome,  could  only 
stand  aside,  watching  with  bitterness  this  infernal  procession  of 
all  the  lusts — always  in  peril  of  being  caught  in  it,  or  of  being 
hurled  by  it  into  the  unexplored  abysm  of  Death. 

As  with  patricians,  so  equally  with  the  people.  To  feast  and 
to  be  amused  had  come  to  be  their  final  ambition.  The  desire  for 
artificial  excitement  incessantly  increased,  as  all  impulse  of  no- 
ble purpose  passed  more  completely  out  of  life ;  and  that  desire 
sought  and  found  its  Koman  answer  in  exhibitions  which  Chris- 
tendom shudders  to  remember,  which  it  hardly  indeed  can 
clearly  recognize  as  having  ever  been  possible  in  the  world. 
Pantomimes  and  buifoonery  of  course  took  the  place  of  the  deli- 
cate comedy  or  the  serious  tragedy  of  the  earlier  time.  The 
scenes  presented  were  full  of  adulteries,  and  amorous  intrigues. 
The  pimp  and  the  courtesan  in  Plautus'  plays  had  a  popularity 
w^hich  Terence  could  not  rival.  The  most  frightful  obscenities 
added  relish  to  the  performance;  and  the  ballet-dancers  danced 
nearly  or  wholly  naked  upon  the  stage. 

Not  even  thus,  however,  were  thoroughly  to  be  stirred  or 
fully  to  be  sated  the  dulled  sensibilities  of  those  who  then  ruled 
the  Roman  world.  Public  games,  and  chariot  races,  into  which 
entered  the  element  of  danger,  were  more  nearly  on  a  level  with 
their  intense  thirst  for  savage  stimulation ;  and  so  these,  intro- 
duced two  centuries  before  Christ,  rapidly  became  a  popular 
passion.  Augustus  surpassed  all  before  him  in  the  frequency 
17 


258  THE  EFFECT  OF   CHRTSTTA^lfTT 

variety,  and  magnificence  of  his  spectacles.*  Titus  gave  a  fes- 
tival  extending  over  a  hundred  days ;  and  Trajan  one  of  more 
than  four  months.  Domitian  crowded  a  hundred  races  into  a 
day,  and  introduced  young  girls  as  contestants.f  The  attendant 
crowds  were  so  enormous  that  lives  were  not  unfrequently  sacri- 
ficed in  the  crush. 

Of  course,  however,  no  games  or  races  of  the  old  Greek  type 
could  meet  that  demand  for  inordinate  excitement  which  grows 
always  by  what  it  consumes,  and  is  more  insatiate  after  every  in- 
dulgence ;  and  so  the  awful  gladiatorial  exhibitions  became  the 
really  eminent  feature  in  the  social  and  popular  life  of  Rome. 
The  Colosseum,  which  contained  eighty  thousand  spectators,  ia 
even  now,  as  has  been  said,  '  the  most  imposing  and  the  most 
characteristic  relic  of  Pagan  Home.'  But  the  Colosseum  was 
small,  compared  with  the  Great  Circus,  which  in  Pliny's  time 
contained  two  hundred  and  sixty  thousand  seats^  and  which 
finally  is  said  to  have  been  made  to  accommodate  nearly  half  a 
million.  There  were  gathered  the  representatives  of  illustrious 
families,  senators,  judges,  philosophers,  poets,  ladies  of  highest 
rank  and  breeding  in  magnificent  apparel,  vestal  virgins,  in  their 
sacred  dress,  in  seats  of  honor — while  around  were  gay  tapestries 
covering  the  stone  benches  and  balustrades,  with  festooned  flow- 
ers, and  shining  metallic  statues  of  the  gods,  while  above  p)arti- 
colored  awnings  sheltered  from  the  sun,  and  while  below  went 
on  the  hideous  unimaginable  work  of  cruelty  and  death. 

In  each  of  twelve  spectacles,  given  by  one  of  the  JEdiles,  from 
a  hundred  and  fifty  to  ^ve  hundred  pairs  of  gladiators  appeared, 
to  fight  to  the  death  with  net,  dagger,  lance,  and  trident,  or  with 
straight  or  curved  blades,  ground  to  the  finest  edge  and  point. 
At  the  triumph  of  Aurelian,  later,  eight  hundred  pairs  of  gladi- 
at/irs  fought ;  ten  thousand  men  during  the  games  of  Trajan. 
Sometimes  female  gladiators  fought,  sometimes  dwarfs,  as  under 
Domitian  ;  §  and  the  condemned,  not  always  if  Christians,  as  by 
Nero,  were  sometimes  burned  in  shirts  of  pitch  to  illuminate 


♦Suetonius:  Oct.  August:,  xliii. 

f  Suetonius :  Domit. :  iv.  J  Nat.  Hist. :  L.  xxxvi. :  24, 

§  Statins:  Silva.;  I.:  Car.  6  :  57-64,  "  Audax  ordo  pumilonum." 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  259 

the  gardens,  or  were  hung  upon  crosses,  and  left  to  be  torn  bji 
famished  bears  before  the  populace.  The  combats  of  animals, 
with  each  other  or  with  men,  were  always  refreshing  to  this  hor- 
rible thirst  for  cruel  excitement.  Criminals,  dressed  in  the  skins 
of  wild  beasts,  were  exposed  to  tortured  and  maddened  bulls. 
Under  !N"ero,  four  hundred  tigers  fought  with  elephants  and 
bulls.  At  the  dedication  of  the  Colosseum,  by  Titus,  five  thou- 
sand animals  were  killed.  The  rhinoceros,  the  hippopotamus, 
the  stag,  the  giraffe,  even  the  crocodile  and  the  serpent,  were 
introduced  in  what  Tertullian  fitly  named  'this  Devil's  pomp';* 
and  there  is  scarcely  one  element  of  horror,  which  can  be  con- 
ceived in  man's  wildest  dreams,  which  was  not  presented  as  a 
matter  of  luxury  to  make  complete  the  '  Eoman  holiday,'  at  the 
time  when  Christianity  entered  the  capital.  Friedlaender  de- 
clares that  the  people  were  seized  with  an  actual  mania,  in  all 
ranks,  of  either  sex,  for  these  terrific  and  ghastly  spectacles. 

A  man  representing  Hercules  was  burned  alive.  Platforms 
were  constructed  to  drop  in  pieces  at  a  signal,  and  launch  those 
upon  them  into  cages  of  devouring  wild  beasts.  ^N'aked  women 
were  bound  by  their  haii*  to  the  horns  of  wild  bulls,  that  the  lust 
and  cruelty  of  the  savage  spectators  might  be  gratified  together.f 
When  even  such  unspeakable  horrors  were  not  enough,  great 
sea-battles  were  arranged,  as  by  Caesar,  by  Augustus,  memorably 
by  Claudius,  who  sent  two  fleets,  with  nineteen  thousand  men 
upon  them,  to  a  desperate  contest  on  the  Lake  Fucinus,  for  the 
mere  amusement  of  the  throngs  of  spectators  covering  the  sur- 
rounding shores.  Domitian,  as  Suetonius  tells  us,  tried  hard  to 
surpass  even  this.  The  terrible  influence  extended  widely  over 
the  provinces.  Men  admired  and  envied  the  incomparable  hor- 
rors of  the  Roman  Colosseum,  and  sought  in  a  humbler  way  to 
repeat  them.  Remains  of  amphitheatres  still  confront  us,  dis- 
tributed in  the  regions  then  subjected  to  the  Empire:  as  at 
Aries  and  Nismes  in  France,  at  Treves  on  the  Moselle,  at  the 
Istrian  Pola,  at  Syracuse  and  other  cities  in  Sicily,  at  Pompeii, 
Psestum,  Capua,  Yerona,  and   elsewhere  in  Italy.      Yet   or\^ 


*  De  Spectaculis,  iv. 

t  See  Renan :  '^  Hibbert  Lectures  "  :  London  ed.,  1880 :  pp.  86-9 


260  THB  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANlTY 

those  built  of  stone,  or  quarried  out  of  hills,  have  survived  the 
turbulent  changes  of  the  centuries.  Friedlaender  gives  a  detailed 
list  of  nearly  a  hundred  and  twenty  amphitheatres  known  to 
have  existed  in  Europe,  besides  those  in  Asia,  or  in  Africa ;  * 
and  indications  are  said  to  remain  at  Caerleon,  Bath,  Dorches- 
ter, and  elsewhere  in  England,  that  the  spectacles,  if  not 
the  vast  buildings  for  their  exhibition,  had  been  carried  by 
the  Roman  legions  into  Britain.  At  the  amphitheatre  in 
Treves  Constantine  himself,  in  his  earlier  career,  at  the  impulse 
of  those  still  surviving  and  terrible  passions  which  Christianity 
had  to  encounter,  twice  exhibited  vast  spectacles :  exposing  un- 
armed Frankish  chieftains  and  soldiers  to  the  fury  of  wild  beasts, 
till  these  were  so  utterly  glutted  with  blood  as  to  refuse  longer 
to  devour,  and  then  commanding  the  prisoners  to  fight  with 
weapons  of  battle,  and  to  kill  each  other  as  gladiators. 

I  cannot  further  unroll  before  you  the  infamous  and  almost 
incredible  history.  You  would  feel  as  if  I  were  asking  you  to 
look  into  the  present  and  palpable  circles  of  Dante's  Inferno. 
But  the  thing  to  be  carefully  noted  is  this :  that  all  this  was  a 
development,  unique  and  awful,  but  entirely  natural,  in  the  so- 
ciety then  foremost  in  the  world.  The  absence  of  any  moral 
purpose,  the  failure  of  even  political  opportunity  after  the  Em- 
pire was  established,  the  rush  upon  Eome  of  mingled  populations 
from  all  parts  of  the  earth,  the  vast  and  sudden  accumulations 
of  wealth  from  the  conquest  of  ancient  and  cultured  nations, 
the  want  of  any  clear  sense  of  a  coming  existence,  and  the  con- 
sequent desire  to  crowd  the  present  with  all  possible  pleasures — 
these  conspired  to  give  to  the  savage  and  sensual  passions  which 
there  broke  loose  the  most  tremendous  exhibition  which  the 
world  has  yet  seen.  And  philosophy  stood  before  the  outburst, 
not  speechless  altogether,  but  certainly  wholly  ineffective  for  its 
restraint.  Indeed,  philosophy  hardly  condemned,  save  with 
bated  breath,  these  scenes  in  the  arena.  Cicero  admits,  in  the 
Tusculan  Questions,  that  by  some,  as  in  his  time  conducted, 
they  were  regarded  as  inhuman,  but  he  adds  his  own  opinion 
that '  when  the  condemned  fight  with  the  sword,  no  better  disci- 


♦"Moeurs  Romaines"  :  Paris  cd.,  1867.    Tom.  II. :  pp.  303-311. 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKmD.  261 

'pline  against  suffering  and  death  could  possibly  be  presented  to 
the  eye.'  *  The  younger  Pliny,  cultivated  and  h  umane,  distinctly 
praised  them,  as  tending  to  inspire  an  honorable  courage,  to 
make  men  regard  wounds  as  glorious,  and  to  hold  death  in  dis- 
•dain.f  Seneca  reproved  them,  to  his  honor  be  it  said,  with  all 
the  energy  that  Stoicism  permitted ;  X  but  Juvenal  hints  no  dis- 
approval, caustic  and  unsparing  as  his  satire  is ;  and  neither 
Tacitus  nor  Suetonius  enters  any  protest  against  what  of  such 
facts  they  were  called  to  record.  Suetonius  distinctly  ranks  the 
atrocities  against  Christians  among  the  more  praiseworthy  acts 
of  I^ero.  Ovid,  you  know,  gives  instruction  to  those  who  are 
present  at  the  spectacles,  women  as  well  as  men,  to  improve  any 
temporary  intervals  of  the  games  in  amorous  converse,  so  natu- 
rally was  an  utter  sensuality  of  spirit  associated  with  the  cruelty 
expressed  and  nurtured  by  these  astounding  and  signifi- 
cant spectacles.  It  had  become  only  literally  true,  what  Livy 
baid,  who  died  while  Jesus  still  tarried  at  l^azareth,  that 
Rome,  which  had  become  great  by  her  virtues,  'had  at  last 
reached  a  point  where  men  could  neither  bear  their  vices  nor 
the  remedies  for  them.'  As  the  elder  Pliny  said,  '  all  liberal 
arts  had  fallen  to  decay,  and  only  those  of  avarice  were  culti- 
vated ;  servility  alone  conducted  to  proUt,  and  men  preferred  to 
foster  the  vices  of  others  rather  than  their  own  good  qualities ; 
a  large  part  of  mankind  had  come  to  think  drunkenness  the  one 
prize  of  life,  and  to  feel  that  the  purpose  for  which  they  had 
been  begotten  was  to  drain  vast  draughts  of  stupefying  wines 
from  lascivious  goblets.'§  Juvenal  bore  his  terrible  testimony 
in  words  which  have  since  been  famous  and  familiar,  that 
*  there  will  be  nothing  further  which  posterity  may  add  to  our 
evil  manners  ;  those  coming  after  can  only  reproduce  our  desires 
and  deeds.  Every  vice  stands  already  at  its  topmost  summit.'  *"'* 
The  dreadful  demoralization  was  not  among  the  rich  alone, 
it  was  in  all  classes,  and  the  very  philosophers  were  sneered  at 
by  the  people  as  only  more  greedy  and  licentious  than  them- 
selves on  a  fit  opportunity.     Troplong  says,  not  too  strongly, 


*  Tuscul.  Qusest. :  II.:  17.  t  Panegyr. :  Cap.  xxxiir. 

X  Ep.  ad  Lucil  vii.         §  Nat.  Hist.,  xiv. :  1,  28.         **  Sat.  I. :  147-9. 


262  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHEISTIAJVITY 

that  "  society  was  profoundly  gangrened."*  It  was  not  a  transient 
debasement  of  manners.  It  was,  as  sceptical  scholars  have  ad- 
mitted, a  radical  and  permanent  degradation  of  the  spirit,  from 
wliich  Mr.  Lecky  earnestly  affirms  that  the  distinctive  Eoman 
people  have  never  recovered.  He  does  not  paint  the  fact  too 
strongly  when  he  speaks  of  the  pages  of  Siietonius  as  remaining 
*  an  eternal  witness  of  the  abysses  of  depravity,  the  hideous  and 
intolerable  cruelty,  the  hitherto  unimagined  extravagances  of 
nameless  lust,  that  were  then  manifested  on  the  Palatine.'  f 
The  people  were  simply  on  fire  of  hell,  with  all  lust  for  what- 
ever would  gratify  an  insatiable  craving  for  viciousness  and  for 
blood ;  while  the  character  of  the  emperors  was  often  such  that 
the  dreadful  words  in  which  Tacitus  sums  up  the  spirit  of  their 
reigns  from  Nero  forward,  is  the  truest  picture :  '  Yirtue  was  a 
sentence  of  Death.'  Even  Eenan  testifies  that  *  in  Kome  every 
vice  flaunted  itself  with  revolting  cynicism,'  and  that  'the  public 
games,  especially,  had  introduced  a  frightful  corruption ';  though 
he  maintains,  and  no  doubt  correctly,  that  domestic  virtue  sur- 
vived to  some  extent  in  the  provinces.^  Uhlhorn  seems  to  me 
to  state  the  fact  with  simple  exactness  when  he  says  that  "  the 
general  conclusion  must  be  that  the  heathen  world  was  ethically 
as  well  as  religiously  at  the  point  of  dissolution  ;  that  it  had  be- 
come as  bankrupt  in  morals  as  in  faith  ;  and  that  there  was  no 
power  at  hand  from  which  restoration  could  proceed."§  Augus- 
tine's searching  judgment  was  that  "  dire  corruption,  more  terri- 
ble than  any  invader,  had  taken  violent  possession,  not  of  the 
walls  of  the  city,  but  of  the  mind  of  the  state."  ** 

Philosophy  tried  to  insert  better  forces ;  but  it  was  like  trying 
to  rear  a  fortress  with  paper  walls,  cemented  by  a  vanishing 
breath.  It  had  no  power  to  compact  and  bind  what  was  sound 
in  society,  still  less  to  build  into  virtuous  beauty  what  there  was 
debased.     The  honest  and  strong  hearts  which  still  remained, 

*  De  rinfluence  du  Cliristianisme:  p.  214. 

t"Hist.  of  European  Morals  ":  New  York  ed.,  1870  :  Vol.  I. :  pp.  276. 
280. 
X  "  Hibbert  Lectures  "  :  London  ed.,  1830  :  p.  23. 
§  "Conflict  of  Christianity  "  :  New  York  ed.,  1879  :  p.  142. 
**  Ep.  cxxxviii.  [to  Marcell.]  c.  16. 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  2CS 

among  men  and  women — like  Helena,  mother  of  Seneca;  like 
Arria,  the  wonderful  wife  of  Psetus,  or  Fannia  her  grand- 
daughter, or  the  wife  of  Macrinus,  of  all  of  ^hom  Pliny  writes ; 
or  like  the  men  whom  he  also  portrays,  grave,  cheerful,  hospita- 
ble, faithful — these  could  no  more  avail  against  the  tumultuous 
flood  of  iniquity  than  a  man  amid  the  rapids  of  Niagara  can 
check  their  current,  or  than  one  caught  in  the  suck  of  a  whirl- 
pool can  fight  the  force  which  pulls  him  downward.  At  a  later 
day,  Marcus  Aurelius  tried  with  his  might  to  reform  the  empire, 
without  Christianity ;  and  his  effort  would  have  been  equally 
successful  if  he  had  tried  by  laws  and  soldiers  to  push  the  planet 
into  another  ethereal  path.  There  was  no  power,  of  philosophical 
teaching,  of  ceremonial  religion,  of  all-regulating  government, 
of  all-criticising  society — there  was  no  power  known  to  heathen- 
ism, of  lovely  art,  historic  recollection,  sonorous  eloquence,  sting- 
ing satire — which  could  avail  in  that  momentous  and  awful  crisis. 
It  seemed  as  if  the  disastrous  influence  of  that  epoch  in  history 
must  continue  to  sweep  on,  pitiless  and  destroying,  over  the 
centuries  which  still  were  to  come,  and  over  the  lands  in  which 
stood  preeminent  the  imperial  and  conquering  name  of  Rome. 
Matthew  Arnold  has  truly  said  : 

On  that  hard  Pagan  world,  disgust 

And  secret  loathing  fell ; 
Deep  weariness,  and  sated  lust, 

Made  human  life  a  hell"! 

The  fury  of  that  iniquitous  license,  the  steam  and  the  stain  of  its 
infernal  exhalations,  are  almost  as  palpable  as  if  they  had  been 
things  of  to-day,  to  one  who  reads  with  discerning  though  well- 
nigh  incredulous  eyes  the  ancient  records. 

Against  this  radical,  frightful,  enthroned  wickedness,  came  \ 
then  the  unrecogaized  power  of  Christianity :  a  new,  unlawful, 
despised  religion,  coming  out  of  the  East,  and  undertaking  to 
change  and  vitally  renew  the  moral  life  of  the  capital  and  the 
ompire.  If  ever  a  claim  to  power  seemed  absurd,  that  was  the 
one.  A  child  oflei-ing  to  stop  with  his  breath  the  blast  of  the 
tornado,  and  to  hurl  it  upward  into  the  air,  would  hardly  have 
seemed  more  impertinent  in  his  challenge  than  did,  to  the  ac- 


2t)4  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHEISTIAJSTITY 

coinplished  pliilosopliers  of  Kome,  this  new  re^ligion,  in   the 

\  work  which  it  undertook. 

The  Jews  had  long  been  suspected  and  hated,  in  the  lloman 
Hepublic,  and  later  in  the  Empire,  as  insubordinate  in  their  po- 
litical attitude,  contemptuous  or  hostile  in  their  religious  posi- 
tion,  unsocial  in  their  manners,  greed j  and  unscrupulous  n  theii 
commercial  relations.  Juvenal  struck  at  them  with  his  sarcastic 
and  sharp-edged  satire.*  Imperial  proclamations  exiled  or  slew 
them,  as  if  thej  had  been  noxious  animals.  Popular  animosity 
took  occasion  of  any  public  calamity  to  denounce  and  destroy 
them.  More  than  once  they  were  driven  out  of  Rome,  ban- 
ished to  islands,  swept  with  pursuing  swords  out  of  Italy,  by 
the  empire  which  had  conquered  their  country  and  capital,  but 
against  which  stood,  erect  and  fierce,  their  unsubdued  wills.  In 
this  vehement  hatred  against  the  Jews  the  Christians  of  course 
shared  at  the  outset,  being  to  the  pagan  world  only  a  new  and 
irritating  sect  under  the  detested  Mosaic  system.  But  soon 
came  the  time  when  the  Jews  hated  and  cast  out  the  Christiana 
with  as  fierce  an  anger  as  they  themselves,  in  the  worst  of  times, 
had  ever  experienced.  The  most  fearful  curses  were  pronounced 
upon  them,  three  times  a  day,  in  the  public  synagogues,  as  trai- 
torous renegades  ;  and  the  separation  of  those  who  still  observed 
the  ancient  Law  from  those  who  had  come  to  larger  light,  be- 
came as  distinct  as  it  has  since  been,  in  any  time. 

/  At  the  same  time,  the  familiar  hostility  of  the  empire  toward  the 
Jews  was  heated  to  a  double  intensity  against  these  recent  per- 
verse schismatics,  whom  even  their  own  nation  rejected.  They 
were  aggressive :  with  a  missionary  zeal  which  sharply  contrasted 
the  previous  intermittent  religious  activities  of  those  from  whom 
they  now  were  severed.  They  criticised,  without  sharing,  the 
cruelty  and  lust  which  were  nearly  omnipresent.  They  oftered 
no  sacrifices,  joined  no  processions,  burned  incense  to  no  em- 
peror; and  they  expected  the  destruction  of  the  empire,  and 
warned  the  most  polished  and  eminent  around  them  that  tre- 
mendous punishments  waited  for  them  unless  they  turned  from 
their  elaborate  and  sumptuous  wickedness.    Whether  they  were 


*  Sat.  XIV. :  96-105  :  et  al. 


ON  THE  MOIIAL  LIFE   OF  MANKIND,  2GC 

right  or  not  in  their  doctrine,  thej  at  least  had  the  strongest 
conviction  of  its  truth,  and  they  uttered  it  in  words  which 
smote  and  stung  like  tongues  of  flame.  It  was  not  unnat- 
ural, therefore,  that  they  should  come  to  be  generally  re- 
garded, as  Tacitus  indicates,  as  '  haters  of  the  human  race ';  * 
that  the  cry,  *  The  Christians  to  the  lions ! '  should  exhibit  the 
impulse  of  popular  fury  whenever  calamities  impended  or  fell ; 
that  the  vehement  scorn  of  men  like  Celsus,  if  directed  against 
both  Jew  and  Christian,  should  fall  on  the  latter  with  fiercest 
force  ;  and  that  persecutions  against  them  should  rage,  not  only 
in  occasional  frantic  outbursts  of  a  tyranny  like  Nero's,  but  un- 
der the  reigns  of  emperors  like  Trajan,  or  like  Marcus  Aurelius. 
If  ever  moral  teachers  stood  at  an*  utter  disadvantage  in  the 
effort  to  make  their  instructions  effective,  certainly  the  Chris- 
tians of  the  empire  did  so ;  and  it  cannot  cease  to  be  matter  of 
wonder,  to  those  who  look  only  on  the  human  side  of  historical  [ 
movements,  that  they  were  so  far  successful  as  tliey  were.  ^ 

But  they  had,  at  least,  a  noble  system,  of  pure,  incisive,  and  ^ 
mandatory  ethics,  with  which  to  work.  According  to  their  con- 
ception of  things,  they  had  a  Master,  of  living  and  sovereign 
spiritual  power,  behind  and  above  them.  They  believed  that 
the  reason  and  conscience  in  men,  to  which  he  had  spoken  while 
manifested  on  eai-th,  must  still  respond  to  the  appeal  of  his 
word  ;  and  they  expected,  in  spite  of  all  apparent  discourage- 
ment, that  that  supreme  word  would  make  its  way,  however  ob- 
scene and  fierce  the  times,  wherever  were  hearts  still  existing  in 
the  world  which  were  in  a  measure,  as  Tertullian  said, '  naturally 
Christian.' 

The  Biblical  morality  of  the  Jews  had  always  been  higher 
than  that  of  the  nations,  in  other  things  more  advanced,  whose 
seats  of  empire  were  around  them.  Nothing  of  the  Egyptian, 
che  Babylonian,  the  Phenician  licentiousness,  had  been  counte- 
nanced by  their  Law,  however  strange  influences  had  now  and 
again  been  imported  from  these  into  their  practice ;  and  the  doc- 
trine of  God  which  was  paramount  among  them,  with  the 
.mighty  overshadowing  commands  of  the  rule  understood  to  be 


*  Annal.  XV. :  44. 


26  a  THE  EFFECT  OF   CHRISTIANITY 

from  Him,  effectively  counteracted,  in  particulars  at  least,  and 
for  considerable  periods  of  time,  the  tendencies  to  iniquity  wliicb 
in  other  religions  were  tolerated  not  only,  but  were  often  clothed 
with  religious  consecration. 

But  now  had  come  a  law  at  once  ampler  and  simpler  than  the 
old,  more  intimate,  more  spiritual,  and  with  far  more  vivid  and 
admonitory  sanctions,  through  the  teaching  of  a  Master  who 
claimed  singular  preeminence,  and  who,  as  those  who  accepted 
him  thought,  had  illustrated  his  claim  by  marvellous  works. 
This  law  revised,  interpreted,  and  surpassed  the  ancient  rules. 
It  insisted  on  utter  pureness  in  the  heart,  and  would  com 
promise  with  no  evil,  of  purpose  or  desire,  of  wandering  thought, 
or  even  of  indifference  to  spiritual  things.  It  was  an  essential 
part  and  power  in  what  they  held  to  be  a  vast,  unique.  Divine 
religion,  which  had  spoken  to  men  with  authority  from  the 
lieavens.  As  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  in  its  finer  penetration 
into  the  hidden  life  of  motives,  in  its  wider  sweep  over  the  rela- 
tions of  men  in  society,  stood  toward  the  Decalogue — not  con- 
tradicting or  annulling  that,  but  under-running,  pervading,  ov^er- 
topping  it,  with  deeper  and  more  celestial  significance — so  stood 
the  whole  moral  system  of  Christianity  to  that  which  had  pre- 
ceded  and  prepared  the  way  for  it.  It  was  pure  as  tbe  light. 
It  had  no  more  tolerance  for  evil,  anywhere,  than  light  has  for 
darkness.  It  searched  and  exposed  the  secrets  of  the  soul :  mak- 
ing sin  more  awful  because  committed  by  one  in  nature  divine, 
against  a  God  whose  inmost  life  was  holy  Love.  Nothing  was 
allowed  by  it,  no  genius,  or  learning,  or  power,  or  renown,  ta 
take  the  place  of  that  vital  and  crystal  purity  within,  which  was 

\  as  the  brightness  of  God's  face. 

/  Nor  was  this  simply  an  ideal  system,  proposed  to  men  for 
their  moral  admiration,  or  their  unimpassioned  intellectual  as- 
sent. That  was  the  tenor  and  utmost  reach  of  the  various  phi- 
losophical or  ethical  schemes  developed  in  society.  But  this  was- 
a  Law  :  obedience  to  which  was  declared  indispensable,  essential 
to  worth,  declarative  of  character,  decisive  of  destiny.  Chris- 
tianity had  an  end  to  accomplish  which  the  ethnic  religionsL- 
never  had  sought.  They,  as  I  have  said,  had  had  no  outlook, 
toward  the  formation  of  nobler  character.    The  Eoman  religion,. 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  5>67 

for  example,  had  been  not  a  system  of  doctrinal  principles  for 
men  to  believe,  or  a  code  of  morals  for  them  to  obey,  but  a  com* 
pact  of  contrivances,  an  elaborate  ancient  public  art,  by  which  it 
was  hoped  to  avert  Divine  jealousy,  or  to  attract  Divine  favor 
toward  either  public  or  personal  enterprise.  So  little  had  that 
religion  ever  sought  to  accomplish  in  regard  to  the  moral  life  of 
the  people,  that  the  sense  of  any  ethical  efficacy  residing  in  a 
system  of  Faith  had  failed  to  assert  itself ;  and  the  heathen  his- 
torians, of  the  earlier  centuries  after  Christ,  did  not  suspect  the 
transcendent  energy  which  under  this  new  form  of  religion  was 
beginning  already  to  restrain  and  renew  the  spirit  of  the  em- 
pire. The  brevity  and  infrequency  of  their  references  to  it  are 
only  thus  to  be  explained;  with  the  fact  that  when  they  did  refer 
to  it,  it  was  always  as  a  strange^  unaccoimtable  superstition. 
But  character  was  the  essential  thing,  under  Christianity.  It 
portrayed  this,  as  it  ought  to  be.  It  demanded  it,  with  a  per- 
emptory, with  what  seemed  an  intolerant,  tone  of  authority.  It 
made  men's  entire  future  experience  depend  on  its  possession, 
and  brought  the  unmeasured  pressure  of  celestial  motives  to 
prompt  to  its  attainment.  And  so  it  smote  the  slumbering  con- 
science as  the  clangor  of  a  thousand  trumpets  in  the  air  could 
hardly  have  smitten  the  startled  sense. 

Not  content,  even,  with  delineating  this  character  in  words,, 
however  glowing  with  inward  lustre,  it  showed  it  in  vivid 
realization,  in  the  personal  Head  of  the  religion :  in  whom 
charity  and  power,  both  passing  the  limits  of  historical  parallel, 
were  declared  to  have  been  inseparably  joined  ;  in  whom  no 
trace  of  the  evil  had  appeared  which  infected  society ;  who  suf- 
fere  J,  though  sovereign  ;  who  was  patient,  amid  incessant  provo- 
cation; who  claimed  for  himself  the  highest  place,  and  the 
largest  authority  over  human  souls,  but  who  yet  gave  his  life  to 
win  the  wandering,  to  enlighten  the  obscured,  to  save  the  con- 
demned. According  to  the  early  Christian  conception,  this  un- 
matched character  had  appeared  in  the  world,  at  once  to  glorify 
and  to  condemn  it,  in  him  whom  his  disciplcc  loved  as  a  brother 
while  revering  him  as  their  Lord.  No  matter  now  when  the 
Gospels  were  written,  or  when  the  oral  tradition  pre-supposed 
became  compact  and  current,  this  conception  of  the  Christ  was 


268  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHIilSTIAJYITY 

certainly  in  the  Church  when  Paul's  principal  epistles  were  writ 
ten  ;  and  it  had  been  there,  as  appears  from  those  epistles,  fronj 
the  beginning.  They  who  early  followed  the  Lord  certainly  be- 
lieved what  Athanase  Coquerel  eloquently  said,  in  answer  to 
Strauss:  that  'Jesus  is  the  ideal  of  virtue;  so  perfect  that  ah 
the  efforts  of  the  most  delicate  conscience,  the  most  fertile  imag- 
ination, the  most  expansive  charity,  cannot  add  to  it  the  least 
trait ';  and  they  also  believed,  with  the  same  enthusiastic  and 
untrammeled  preacher,  that  the  ideal  thus  exhibited  is  a  practi 
cal  ideal ;  that  the  Lord  had  clothed  himself  with  a  perfection 
proportional  to  our  faculties;  and  that  while  we  admire,  extol, 
and  worship,  we  are  also  under  supreme  obligation,  through  the 
help  which  he  offers,  to  aspire  to  resemble  him.* 

In  order  to  such  personal  reproduction  of  the  Christ  in  one's 
spiritual  life,  faith  in  him  was  demanded  and  inspired — a  wholly 
new  and  transfiguring  force ;  not  a  mental  assent  to  conceded 
propositions,  this  had  been  familiar ;  not  an  unloving  submis- 
sion of  the  will  to  a  power  above  it,  that  too  had  been  common ; 
but  faith,  confiding,  affectionate,  self -consecrating,  in  a  living 
Teacher,  Saviour,  Lord,  ascended  to  the  heavens,  but  still  as  per- 
sonal as  when  on  the  earth — this  was  what  Christianity  began 
with,  as  the  essential  primal  element  in  any  true  experience  of 
its  power.  In  this  was  freedom,  fervor  of  feeling,  the  joyful  con- 
sciousness of  inward  sympathy  with  the  Divine.  It  had  hope 
in  it,  gladness,  a  certain  exulting  passion  of  the  soul ;  and  by  it 
that  soul,  thus  united  to  the  Master,  should  be  inwardly  charged 
with  his  purifying  energy,  should  feel  a  flash  of  God's  life  within 
it,  should  rise  to  even  ecstatic  victory,  and  should  go  into  the 
world,  as  the  Lord  himself  had  been  sent  by  the  Father,  to  illu- 
minate and  renew  it.  Under  the  light,  and  in  the  impulse,  of 
this  central  and  sovereign  principle  of  faith  in  a  loved  and 
reigning  Master  in  the  heavens,  a  wholly  new  conception  became 
common  of  the  nobleness  and  delight  of  such  a  service  as  that 
which  he  offered.  It  was  recognized  as  adding  wings,  not  weights, 
to  the  consecrated  spirit;  as  freeing,  not  fettering;  as  infusing 
fiuch  bounteous  and  inexhaustible  energy  into  spirit  and  will  aa 


*  See  Thomson's  Bampton  Lectures :  London  ed.,  1853  :  pp.  283-5. 


CN  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKmi).  ^'jO* 

would  carry  one,  almost  without  consciousness  of  effort,  through 
hardest  contest,  to  the  height  of  attainments  before  un conceived.  / 

This  was  certainly  illustrated  multitudes  of  times  by  disciples 
whose  names  are  lost  from  history,  as  the  brightness  of  their 
particular  careers  has  been  merged  in  the  galaxy  of  the  first 
Christian  centuries.  They  might  honestly  say  with  Octavius,  in 
the  famous  dialogue  of  Minucius  Felix :  *  We  may  not  speak 
great  things,  but  we  live  them.'  By  none,  surely,  could  it  have 
been  shown  more  nobly  than  by  Paul:  the  independent,  in- 
trepid, and  heroic  apostle,  who  yet  gloried  in  subscribing  him- 
self '  the  slave  of  Christ,'  and  whose  joy  it  was  to  bear  in  his 
body  the  marks  of  stone  and  scourge  and  chain  which  showed  his 
triumphant  subjection  to  the  Lord.  There  was  in  all  this,  in  him 
and  in  others,  a  something  unparalleled  in  human  experience :  an 
electric  flame,  not  quenching  but  surpassing  all  common  fires  ; 
a  celestial  energy,  contrasting  the  most  vital  and  forcible  spirit  be- 
fore known  among  men.  Its  intensity,  and  its  property  of  rapid  dis- 
tribution, were  simply  incalculable.  All  former  precedents  ceased 
to  apply,  when  elements  so  novel  and  so  transcendent  entered  into 
the  problem  of  whether  society  could  be  reformed.  There  was  no 
momentary  doubt  or  pause  on  the  part  of  disciples,  who  shared 
in  the  temper  because  sharing  in  the  faith  of  him  who  thought 
he  had  seen  the  Master  on  the  way  to  Damascus.  They  did  not 
even  take  up  their  work  with  timidity,  caution,  or  prudential  re- 
serve. It  was  with  a  glad  victorious  energy,  with  a  step  that 
echoed  the  Jubilate,  that  they  went  upon  their  errand  :  not 
ashamed  of  the  Gospel  of  Christ ;  ready  to  preach  it  at  Ephesus, 
or  Corinth,  or  in  the  front  of  Roman  pride ;  anticipating  pains, 
but  expecting  them  soon  to  give  place  to  palms ;  looking  for  re- 
eistance,  but  never  afraid  of  it,  and  assured  that  in  the  end  it 
must  yield  before  him  whose  very  cross  had  now  become  their 
mightiest  instrument,  in  whose  supremacy,  to  their  thought  at 
least,  lay  the  hope  of  the  world,  and  for  whom  it  was  the  su- 
preme desire  of  their  triumphing  souls  to  serve  and  to  suffer. 

They  knew  that  they  had  a  vast  system  behind  them,  of  law, 
pi-ophecy,  rite,  song,  all  which  they  felt  had  pointed  forward  to 
the  coming  of  the  Christ.  They  believed  that  he  had  appeared 
in  the  world,  heralded  by  wonders,  manifest  in  miracles,  illus> 


270  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

trious  on  the  mount,  crowned  in  the  ascension,  more  jjowerfii^ 
than  monarchs,  more  winning  and  tender  than  anj  friend.  The^^ 
thought  that  he  had  sent  a  wonderful  energy  upon  the  apostles, 
to  turn  their  cowardice  into  courage,  and  to  unfold  in  them  a 
moral  preeminence  before  unsuspected.  They  did  not  doubt  that 
be  could  again  interpose,  when  needed,  to  change  antagonists  into 
disciples,  and  to  make  the  intensest  zeal  for  antiquity  obey  and 
serve  him.  And  the  work  before  them,  in  converting  individuals 
or  in  purifying  peoples,  with  the  help  of  his  grace  it  seemed 
nowise  impossible.  It  mattered  little,  before  the  impact  of  his 
word  and  the  might  of  his  Spirit,  how  vile  and  fierce  was  the 
temper  of  sin  in  any  heart,  or  how  tenacious  the  chains  of  its 
habit  over  life.  They  saw  that  temper  most  terribly  illustrated 
in  the  murder  of  the  Lord,  in  which  Jew  and  Gentile,  Roman 
governor,  legionary  soldier,  had  equally  had  part.  But  they 
saw  as  well,  or  thought  they  saw,  that  his  murderers  themselves 
had  felt  the  impression  of  a  something  unequalled  and  subduing 
in  his  death,  as  connected  with  what  followed  it,  and  that  many 
of  them,  pricked  to  the  heart,  had  accepted  his  rule.  And  in 
spite  of  all  the  energy  of  sin,  and  all  the  temptations  which  re- 
newed this  from  without,  they  thought  that  each  one,  if  appealed 
to  aright,  might  be  led  to  turn  in  penitence  and  faith  to  him  in 
whose  coming  the  world  was  illustrious,  to  him  by  whose  future 
coming  for  Judgment  its  history  should  be  finished. 

An  influence  from  himself  was  promised  and  assured,  to  their 
apprehension,  to  accompany  their  appeal,  and  to  give  Divine  suc- 
cor to  those  who  should  hear  this,  in  their  struggle  for  holiness ; 
while  the  tremendous  stimulants  to  such  struggle  which  came 
from  the  discovery  professedly  made  by  the  new  religion  of  the 
realms  beyond  the  grave,  and  of  the  relations  declared  to  sub- 
sist between  character  here  and  recompense  there — these  were 
obvious  to  their  minds,  and  had  prodigious  power  for  others. 
Infidel  historians  have  admitted  the  unique  and  capital  force  of 
this  majestic  and  vivid  appeal  from  the  eternities,  breaking  forth 
upon  men,  and  have  ranked  it  chiefest  among  the  instruments 
by  which  the  empire  at  last  was  subdued.  Each  warning  had 
its  correlative  promise ;  and  the  exultation  of  Christian  hope  was 
uttered  in  the  song  last  on  the  lips  of  the  dying  believer,  in  the 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  271 

words  01  final  assurance  and  victory  inscribed  on  bis  cell  in  tbe 
catacomb-crypts. 

Men  bad,  tberefore,  by  degi-ees,  to  recognize  tbe  fact  tbat  a  N 
new  character  had  appeared  in  the  world,  among  men  like  them- 
selves:  a  character  in  which  gentleness,  sweetness,  and  saint- 
liness  of  demeanor  were  combined  with  enthusiasm,  and  inflexible 
zeal ;  in  which  was  a  joy  that  blended  inseparably  with  supremft 
self-devotion,  and  a  conquering  hope  that  no  enmities  could 
€rush.  It  was  an  evangel  in  human  life ;  a  discovery  of  some- 
thing transcendent  in  the  spirit;  a  living  revelation  of  forces 
supernal.  The  gentler  virtues  had  not  been  nnhonored  in  the  old 
civilization.  Euripides  had  celebrated  the  beauty  of  them,  in  his 
admired  and  musical  verse,  long  before  Christianity  appeared. 
At  the  very  time  when  the  Roman  women  had  largely  come  to  be 
what  the  historians  and  satinsts  describe,  in  the  passages  I  have 
cited,  on  the  tombs  of  some  of  them  were  placed  inscriptions  by 
those  who  survived  them,  full  of  tender  affection  and  exquisite 
pathos,  commemorating  their  modesty,  sweetness,  gentleness, 
their  prudence  in  affairs,  and  their  affection  for  home.*  And 
at  a  time  not  long  subsequent  to  this,  Plutarch  finely  illustrated 
while  nobly  commending  the  same  class  of  virtues.  But  never 
had  they  had  such  honor  in  the  world  as  when  Jesus  showed 
them  exemplified  in  himself,  and  put  the  whole  pressure  of  his 
religion  upon  the  inspii'ation  of  such  in  others ;  as  when  Paul  wrote 
to  the  rough  and  hardy  Galatian  herdsmen,  sprung  from  the 
fiercest  fighting  tribes,  that  '  the  fruits  of  the  Spirit '  are  those 
delicate  and  almost  feminine  graces,  '  love,  joy,  peace,  long-suf- 
fering, gentleness,  goodness,  faith,  meekness,  temperance';'!'  as 
when  Peter,  or  some  one  writing  in  his  name,  led  out  as  figures 
in  the  Christian  chorus,  surpassing  all  that  had  ever  been  seen 
on  Grecian  stage,  '  faith,  courage,  knowledge,  self-restraint,  pa- 
tieLfc  endurance,  godliness  of  spirit,  brotherly  kindness,  and 
finally  charity.'  X  ^ 

A  certain  glad  and  stately  modesty,  affectionate  yet  reserved, 
among  women  especially,  replaced  the  old  frivolity  and  license 


*  See  Northcote  •  "  Epitaphs  of  Catacombs  " :  pp.  69-70. 
+  Galatians  v.  32-23.  J  3  Peter  i.  5-7. 


272  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITY 

Tet  consecration  in  them  was  only  more  eager  and  complete- 
than  in  men  ;  and  the  wrist  accustomed  to  bracelets  threw  them 
off,  according  not  more  to  the  instruction  of  teachers  than  to  the 
joyful  impulse  of  the  heart,  that  it  might  be  readier  for  the 
hard  chain  ;  the  neck  hung  with  emeralds  and  pearls  unclasped 
disdained,  and  laid  them  aside,  that  it  might  give  room,  if  neod 
be,  to  the  broadsword.  Not  thus,  only,  were  previous  ornaments 
of  luxury  discarded,  but  to  furnish  the  means  for  ministering 
more  amply  to  the  wants  of  the  needy.  For  a  new  charity  was 
now  in  the  world  :  a  law  of  benevolence,  enjoined  by  Christ,  il- 
lustrated in  him,  and  made  obligatory  upon  his  disciples,  obedi- 
ence to  which  became  a  delight  under  the  impulse  of  his  Spirit. 
There  had  been  no  such  systematic  benevolence,  either  in  ex- 
tent or  in  profound  and  animating  spiritual  impulse,  in  Greece, 
or  in  Rome.  Neither  the  art  of  the  one,  nor  the  power  of  the 
other,  had  taken  from  it  any  softer  illumination.  At  Athens  had 
been,  as  I  have  said,  an  altar  to  Pity ;  but  without  worshipper, 
priest,  or  offering.  In  later  times,  a  provision  had  been  made 
there  for  orphans,  and  for  the  poor ;  but  no  eager  or  general 
enthusiasm  had  been  awakened  by  it,  and  it  rather  recorded  than 
relieved  the  sufferins:  which  it  recoofnized.  At  Home  were  oc- 
casional  spasms  of  sympathy,  when  multitudes  had  been  killed,, 
and  other  multitudes  had  been  left  destitute,  by  some  unusual 
calamity.  Imperial  largesses,  of  money  or  public  banquets,  had 
on  special  occasions  been  given  to  the  populace ;  while  regular 
distributions  of  corn  and  of  oil  contributed  to  keep  citizens  alive 
without  work,  and  to  make  them  more  contented  with  the  gov- 
ernment by  which  such  supplies  were  provided.  But  the 
pi'evalent  tendencies  of  the  ethnic  civilizations  had  been  to 
restrict  and  localize  affection,  and  to  discourage  sympathy. 
The  popular  temper  had  been  too  hard,  and  too  intent  on  in- 
cessant excitement,  to  leave  room  for  gentle  and  generous  af- 
fection ;  and  the  Stoical  philosophy,  the  best  of  the  time,  even 
as  elaborated  by  one  like  Seneca,  declared  sympathetic  pity  a 
vice  of  the  mind,  and  that  benefits  were  only  rendered  wisely 
when  rendered  as  a  matter  of  general  equity.  But  the  law 
of  Christianity  was  to  love  all  men,  especially  those  of  the 
household  of  faith  ;  and  this,  as  not  only  proclaimed  by  the  lipa 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  273 

but  realized  in  the  life  of  many,  broke  as  a  sunbeam  out  of 
heaven,  through  darkness  and  cloud,  on  the  ancient  world. 

Philosophers  had  sometimes  suggested  the  sovereignty  of  the 
humane  sentiments  as  a  remote  and  delightful  ideal;  but  what 
has  been  truly  called  by  one  of  their  admirers  their  ^  reasoned 
and  passionless  philanthropy '  had  had  no  power  to  solace  sor- 
1  ow,  to  relieve  labor,  to  comfort  the  poor,  to  inspire  or  quicken 
despondent  souls,  l^ow  came  a  law  of  charity  to  mankind  :  be- 
lieved to  have  been  incarnated  in  the  Christ,  warmly  welcomed 
and  ardently  realized  by  his  followers ;  which  sought  the  weary, 
the  needy,  and  the  sick ;  which  knew  no  bounds  of  race  or  tongue, 
which  prayed  for  even  the  judge  who  sentenced,  and  the  savage 
executioner  whose  blade  struck  the  blow.  When  the  Archdea- 
con Laurentius  was  called  upon  by  the  prefect  of  the  city  for 
the  treasures  of  the  Koman  church,  he  presented  under  the 
colonnades  the  poor,  the  crippled,  and  the  sick,  whom  tliis  had 
sheltered  and  nourished.  It  was  thought  so  stinging  a  sarcasm 
that  roasting  alive  was  not  a  punishment  too  severe.  In  the 
middle  of  the  third  century  the  Roman  bishop  wrote  of  more 
than  fifteen  hundred  persons,  the  needy,  the  suffering,  and  the 
widows,  cared  for  and  nourished  by  the  church  in  the  capital."^ 
When  pestilence  raged,  the  Christians  cared  for  the  heathen 
sick,  so  far  as  they  could  soothed  the  dying  who  knew  not 
Christ,  and  with  hands  soon  to  be  fettered  or  burned  buried  tht. 
dead.  The  words  which  were  said  to  have  been  on  the  lips  of 
the  first  revered  martyr,  in  the  hour  of  his  death,  were  often  on 
their  lips,  as  they  faced  the  sword,  the  cross,  or  the  stake  : 
"  Lord,  lay  not  this  sin  to  their  charge !  "  f 

The  moral  realms  of  the  ancient  world  were  thus  compelled 
to  recognize  the  fact  that  a  something  Divine  in  spirit  and  life 
had  suddenly  appeared,  to  break  the  long  and  strong  contexture 
of  selfish  customs.  Yivid  as  lightning,  yet  soft  and  sweet  as 
summer-airs,  the  new  influence  streamed  on  the  world  ;  and  its 
transfiguring  energy  wrought,  with  accelerating  progress,  to 
majestic  effects.  Representatives  of  noble  families  began  to 
accept  this  mysterious  religion,  so  full  of  tenderness  and  of  con- 


*  Eusebius:  Eccl.  Hist.  VI.:  43.  ,  t  Acts  vii.  60. 

18 


274  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITY 

quering  hope,  so  manifestly  nobler  and  more  transforming  than 
had  before  been  known  among  men.  The  catacombs  show  that 
members  of  the  Pomponian  gens,  and  probably  of  the  Flavian, 
were  among  them.  Domitian,  during  the  first  Christian  cen- 
tury, condemned  his  cousin,  Flavins  Clemens,  to  death,  and  the 
wife  of  Clemens,  his  own  niece,  Flavia  Domitilla,  to  exile,  on 
the  charge  of  atheism,  which  was  the  common  accusation  against 
Christians.  In  the  time  of  Hadi'ian,  distinguished  philosophers 
became  Christians,  as  Aristeides,  and  Quadratus ;  a  little  later, 
Justin  Martyr,  with  orators,  lawyers,  and  men  in  repute  for  ex- 
cellent learning.  Hadrian  is  reported  by  Lampridius  to  have 
thought  of  enthroning  the  Founder  of  Christianity  among  the 
gods  of  the  empire,  though  dissuaded  from  doing  it.  And  how- 
ever doubtful  this  may  be,  it  is  certain  that  Alexander  Severus 
kept  in  his  oratory  an  image  of  Christ,  with  those  of  Orpheus, 
Abraham,  and  Apollonius.  The  despised  *  religion  of  weavers, 
shoemakers,  and  slaves,'  had  at  last  by  its  ethics,  as  well  as  by 
its  surpassing  declarations  and  imperial  doctrines,  impressed  the 
empire ;  and  the  very  persecutions  which  then  burst  fortli 
against  it  remain  as  the  appalling  demonstration  of  its  exciting 
and  commanding  effectiveness. 

There  is  something  in  these  before  which  the  imagination,  re- 
placing them  in  particulars  as  well  as  in  mass  in  the  lurid  pic- 
ture of  ancient  society,  still  stands  aghast,  as  if  facing  dii-ectly 
diabolical  energies.  When  the  Master  was  on  earth  it  seems  to 
be  the  evident  sense  of  the  Gospels — whether  justified  or  not,  I 
do  not  here  affirm — that  evil  personalities  in  the  realms  pi-eter- 
natural  were  fiercely  and  stubbornly  stirred  against  him,  till 
earth  and  air  swarmed  with  the  powers  of  a  hideous  malice  be- 
yond man's  emulation.  If  men  count  that  a  fiction  of  the  fancy, 
they  may  see  what  almost  answers  to  it  in  the  fury  which  broke  on 
the  Christian  comm  unities  which  were  peacefully  \v:orshipping  and 
working  beneficence,  in  the  capital  and  the  provinces,  when  scores 
of  years  had  succeeded  the  death  of  their  Lord.  As  dynam- 
ite explodes  at  the  tap  of  the  hammer,  the  whole  savage 
empire  smote  them  with  an  unutterable  fierceness,  and  wrap- 
ped them  in  consuming  fury.  But  the  attitude  which  they 
held,  in  the  midst  of  it  all,  only  gave  another  sublimer  procla- 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  275 

matioii  to  the  novel  Faith  for  which  thej  dauntlessly  suf- 
fered. As  St.  Marc  Girardin  said,  '  The  truth  of  that  era  waa 
too  great  to  make  poets,  it  could  only  make  martyrs.' 

Instantaneous  death,  in  whatever  savage  and  horrible  form, 
was  not  the  worst  which  they  encountered,  when  a  word  of  re- 
cantation, or  a  motion  of  the  hand,  would  have  instantly  saved 
them.  Many  were  banished  to  distant  mines,  to  work  among 
the  worst  of  criminals,  in  a  service  so  hard  that  death  be- 
came a  desired  relief.  Matrons  and  virgins  were  doomed  to 
outrage  in  public  brothels.  Great  teachers  and  bishops,  like  Ig- 
natius and  Polycarp,  were  ground,  as  Ignatius  said,  '  like  the 
wheat  of  God,  between  the  teeth  of  wild  beasts,  into  the  pure 
bread  of  Christ ';  or  they  were  burned  at  the  stake,  only  asking, 
with  Polycarp,  not  to  be  fettered  or  fastened  to  the  wood,  that 
their  firmness  might  be  shown,  and  praising  God  that  they  were 
permitted  to  be  numbered  with  his  witnesses,  and  to  partake  of 
the  cup  of  Christ.  Humble  women,  like  Blandina  at  Lyons,  en- 
dured every  species  of  torture  without  flinching,  saying  only,  to 
all  questions :  *  I  am  a  Christian  ;  we  have  done  no  wickedness.' 
Reserved  to  be  the  last  to  suffer  death,  having  encouraged  the 
others  and  witnessed  their  agony,  she  was  immeshed,  without  re- 
sistance, in  the  confining  net,  and  delivered  to  the  fury  of  the  wild 
bull.  Potamisena,  rejoicing  to  have  escaped  the  threatened  out- 
rage of  hei-  chastity,  died  cheerfully,  with  her  mother,  in  the  bath 
of  boiling  pitch.  Perpetua,  at  Carthage,  only  daughter  as  well 
as  wife  and  recent  mother,  at  twenty-two  years  of  age,  went 
forth  from  the  agonized  entreaties  of  her  father,  and  harder  yet 
from  the  clinging  arms  of  her  little  babe,  to  die  for  him  who 
had  come  from  Heaven,  as  she  surely  thought,  for  her  salvation 
and  who  had  said :  "  Whoso  loveth  father  or  mother  more  than 
me,  is  not  worthy  of  me  " ! 

These,  remember,  are  not  pictures  of  the  fancy,  or  extrava- 
gant legends.  They  are  facts,  authenticated  by  the  soberest  his- 
tory. The  most  sceptical  concede  the  intensity  of  the  suffering, 
though  some,  with  Gibbon,  have  tried  unduly  to  limit  its  extent. 
Mr.  Lecky,  whom  certainly  no  one  will  suspect  of  a  too  great 
enthusiasm  for  historical  Christianity,  sums  up  the  whole  mattei 
in   these  terrible  words:     "We  read   of   Christians   bound  in 


2Y6  THE  EFFECT  OF   CHRISTIANITY 

chairs  of  red-hot  iron,  while  the  stench  of  their  half -consumed 
bodies  rose  in  a  suffocating  cloud  to  heaven  ;  of  others  torn  to 
the  very  bone  by  shells  or  hooks  of  iron;  of  holy  virgins  given 
over  to  the  lust  of  the  gladiator,  or  the  mercies  of  the  pander  ; 
of  227  converts  sent  on  one  occasion  to  the  mines,  each  with  the 
sinews  of  one  leg  severed  by  a  hot  iron,  and  with  an  eye  scooped 
from  the  socket;  of  fires  so  slow  that  the  victims  writhed  for 
hours  in  their  agony  ;  .  .  of  tortures  prolonged  and  varied 
through  entire  days.  For  the  love  of  their  Divine  Master,"  he 
adds,  *'  for  the  cause  which  they  believed  to  be  true,  men,  and 
even  weak  girls,  endured  these  things,  when  one  word  would 
liave  freed  them  from  their  sufferings."*  Eusebius's  History,, 
especially  in  the  eighth  book  and  the  book  of  the  Martyrs,  in* 
dividualizes  the  solemn  and  awful  history  with  a  pathos  which 
all  intervening  centuries  have  not  exhausted. 

It  was  simpl}^  impossible  that  such  amazing  exhibitions  should 
appear,  of  spiritual  supremacy  quenching  pain  and  conquering 
death,  in  tlie  midst  of  vices,  cruelties,  obscenities,  amorous 
odes,  decaying  religions,  and  pallid  philosophies,  without  pro- 
ducing a  vast  impression  on  an  ever-enlarging  circle  of  minds. 
These  persons,  it  was  known,  had  been  concerned  in  no  con- 
spiracy, had  been  sentenced  for  no  want  of  civic  fidelity,  for  no- 
refusal  even  of  the  military  service.  Yet,  as  one  of  their  histo- 
rians said,  *  the  Syrias  reeked  with  the  odor  of  their  corpses,  and 
the  waters  of  the  Rhone  failed  to  wash  from  Gaul  their  blood.'  f 
A  certain  sympathy  for  them  became  inevitable,  in  all  noble  and 
sensitive  spirits.  When  their  sufferings  were  borne  in  the  spirit 
of  Perpetua,  who  returned  joyfully  to  the  prison  after  being  con- 
demned to  the  wild  beasts,  or  of  Felicitas,  giving  her  companions 
the  kiss  of  peace  under  the  very  gleam  of  the  sword — when  it 
was  united  not  only  with  pureness  of  manners  and  gentleness  of. 
Bpeech,  but  with  a  patient  assiduity  in  kindness  which  continued 
to  the  end,  and  with  a  wholly  unconquerable  temper  of  self- 
forgetful  love  and  of  triumphing  hope — there  could  be  scarcely 


*  ** History  of  European  Morals";  New  York  ed.,  1876:  Vol.  I.:  pp^ 
497-8. 

tTertulliun:  '♦  Ad  Nationes  ":  I.  xvii.  ^ 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE   OF  3IANKIND.  27T 

an  J  soul  so  hard  and  dark  that  it  should  not  feel  an  over-master- 
ing  force  from  such  example?,  that  it  should  not  be  conscious 
of  a  strange  gleam  from  worlds  above. 

In  an  age  from  which  all  moral  earnestness  had  seemed  to 
have  departed,  here  it  was,  in  most  intense  and  surpassing  exhi- 
bition, unparalleled  since  man  had  stood  upon  the  planet.  In  a 
heathenism  which  had  had  no  bright  or  large  inspirations  of 
hope,  which  was  full  rather  of  deprecation  and  fear,  here  was  a 
gladness  springing  from  such  hope  in  the  God  now  fully  de- 
clared to  the  world — a  gladness  which  slavery  could  not  crush 
or  the  deepest  dungeons  even  silence,  and  which  the  most  in- 
fernal tortures  could  no  more  conquer  than  they  could  break  the 
sunshine  on  wheels,  or  brand  the  sunbeams  with  hot  irons. 
"  Dum  premor,  attollor,"  was  the  motto  on  a  book  of  Edward 
Sixth,  with  the  figure  beneath  it  of  a  fountain  whose  waters  were 
flung  by  pressure  toward  the  sky.  It  was  typical  of  what  has  often 
appeared  in  gentle  spirits.  The  mind  of  man  shows  something  of 
its  power  when  it  curbs  elemental  forces  of  nature,  and  musters 
and  marshals  the  energies  which  its  research  finds  into  a  series 
of  instruments  for  its  work.  But  there  breaks  into  sight  a  more 
vivid  and  unsearchable  display  of  its  supremacy,  it  shows  more 
regally  the  inherent  majesty  which  belongs  to  its  life,  when  it 
faces  without  flinching  the  most  desperate  oppositions  raging 
against  it,  and  only  reaches  the  sublimity  of  a  triumphant  calm 
before  whatever  man  can  do.  It  feels  itself  then  free  of  the 
universe,  the  heir  of  transcendent  and  eternal  experience,  alone 
among  men,  but  only  more  consciously  allied  with  God.  So  the 
spirit  of  disciples  even  rose  in  enthusiasm  as  the  outrages  in- 
flicted became  more  dreadful.  There  was  at  length  almost  a 
passion  among  them  for  enduring  such  suffering,  which  had  to 
be  restrained  by  vigilant  teachers, — their  spirits  aspiring  more 
eagerly  toward  the  path  which  led  to  Heaven,  while  the  deviltry 
of  earth  was  crowding  them  faster  into  bloody  graves. 

At  last,  therefore,  the  whole  empire  had  to  yield  to  this  new 
and  amazing  energy  descending  upon  it  out  of  Palestine.  Tertul- 
lian  was  right  in  saying :  "  The  oftener  we  are  mown  down  by 
you,  the  more  in  numbers  do  we  grow.    The  blood  of  Christians  ii 


27S  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITY 

the  seed  of  tlie  harvest."  *  Justin  Martyr  was  lifted  out  of  hi» 
philosophy,  he  says  himself,  by  these  brave  deaths.  Many  othera^ 
followed,  on  that  path  of  discipleship  so  fearfully  and  sublimely 
illumined.  The  Jews,  who  should  have  been  first,  according  to 
human  probabilities,  to  receive  Christianity,  repulsed  and  scorned 
it ;  and  after  the  Talmud  in  its  first  part,  or  the  Mishna.  had  been 
collected,  were  separated  into  fiercest  hostility  against  it.  But 
the  savage,  sensual,  luxurious  empire,  whose  moral  life  had 
seemed  nearly  extinct,  whose  wickedness  was  as  preeminent  as  its 
power,  did  accept  it,  and  find  by  it  at  least  a  partial  renovation. 
The  history  of  the  change  I  may  glance  at  again  in  the  follow- 
/  ing  lecture.  The  reason  for  it  is  what  now  is  before  us :  and  T 
certainly  do  not  think  that  Mr.  Lecky  overstates  the  case  when 
I  he  says,  repeatedly,  that  Christianity  conquered  because  'it 
\  united  with  its  distinctive  teaching  a  pure  and  noble  system  of 
I  ethics,  and  proved  itself  capable  of  realizing  it  in  action';  'it 
produced  more  heroic  actions,  and  formed  more  upright  men 
than  any  other  creed ';  it  *  transformed  the  character  of  multi- 
tudes, vivified  the  cold  heart  by  a  new  enthusiasm,  redeemed, 
regenerated,  and  emancipated  the  most  depraved  of  mankind. 
IToble  lives,'  he  adds,  '  crowned  by  heroic  deaths,  were  the  best 
arguments  for  the  infant  church.'  f  Kenan,  with  equal  frank- 
ness, admits  that  what  effected  "  the  true  miracle  of  nascent 
Christianity,"  was  "  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  strongly  grafted  into  his 
disciples ;  the  spirit  of  sweetness,  of  self-abnegation,  of  forget- 
fulness  of  the  present ;  that  unique  pursuit  of  inward  joys  which 
kills  ambition  ;  that  preference  boldly  given  to  childhood  ;  those 
words,  .  .  *  Whosoever  will  be  chief  among  you,  let  him  be 
\  your  servant!'":]: 

I  believe,  for  myself,  that  the  kingly  declarations  of  alleged 
transcendent  and  vital  facts,  with  their  majestic  coordinated  doc- 
trines, as  presented  to  men  by  the  new  religion,  had  more  to  do 
than  these  distinguished  writers  would  admit,  with  the  impres- 
sion  which  it  made  on  the  empire ;  while  I  also  undoubtingly 

*Apol.  c.  50. 

t  "  Hist,  of  European  Morals  ":  New  York  ed.,  1876,  Vol.  I. :  pp.  412, 419 
441. 

X  "  Hibbert  Lectures '' :  London  ed.,  1880  ;  p.  159. 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  279 

believe  that  providential  guidances  and  spiritual  aids,  from  above 
the  earth,  were  Divinely  accessory  to  it.  But,  no  matter  what  \ 
the  explanation  may  be,  the  fact  remains  indestructible  in  his- 
tory :  that  the  religion  preached  by  Jesus — simple  as  it  seemed, 
and  wanting  in  any  equipment  whatever  of  secular  force,  with  no 
slightest  aid  from  army  or  navy,  treasury  or  senate,  and  with  all 
the  letters  and  arts  of  the  age  for  its  unwearied  moral  oppo- 
nents— took  the  foremost  peoples  and  cities  of  the  world,  at  the 
time  when  vice  in  every  form  was  most  triumphant  and  most 
universal,  and  wrought  a  change  unprophesied  and  unmeasured. 
It  conquered,  where  philosophies  had  failed.  It  exalted,  where 
arts  had  degraded.  It  purified,  where  religions  had  polluted ; 
and,  in  the  eloquent  words  of  another,  it  made  '  the  instrument 
of  the  slave's  agony  a  symbol  more  glorious  than  the  laticlave  of 
consuls  or  the  diadem  of  kings.'*  The  splendor  of  that  su- 
preme achievement  no  scepticism  can  shadow,  no  lapse  of  time 
rob  of  its  brightness. 

From  that  effect  an  influence  has  flowed,  with  sure  though 
often  unrecognized  force,  upon  the  moral  life  of  the  world.  By 
the  same  power  which  wrought  that  change — weak,  apparently, 
as  the  staff  of  Moses,  which  *  being  one,  and  an  instrument  of 
peace,  did  yet  break  in  shivers  all  weapons  of  war,  the  ten 
thousand  spears  of  Pharaoh  and  his  captains' — other  similar 
changes,  if  not  equal  in  prominence,  have  since  been  accom- 
plished, among  Goths  and  Huns,  Celts  and  Slavonians,  wherever 
the  Gospel  in  the  fullness  of  its  energy  has  come  to  be  estab- 
lished. It  is  not  true,  of  course,  that  it  ever  has  had  an  unob- 
structed way  on  the  earth.  It  contemplates  the  fact  of  sin  in 
the  soul,  finds  it  secreted  in  the  sources  of  life,  and  expects  to 
be  encountered  by  its  resistance  till  the  spirit  of  man  has  been 
everywhere  subdued  to  Him  who  leads  captivity  captive.  There 
have  been  men  who  claimed  to  be  its  eminent  disciples  who  have 
been  as  untouched  by  its  spiritual  power  as  any  of  the  philoso- 
phers who  sneered  at  its  principles,  or  the  profligate  patricians 
vvho  gnashed  their  teeth  at  its  mandatory  restraints.  They  have 
only  hidden,  under  the  disguise  of  the  Christian  profession,  a  more 

*F.  W.  Farrar;  "Witness  of  History  to  Christ":  London  ed.,  1872 
p.  100. 


280  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

treacherous  untruth  and  a  crueler  Inst.  There  have  been  pericx]?. 
in  the  history  of  Christendom  in  which  the  moral  power  of  ita 
religion  has  seemed  almost  paralyzed :  as  there  are  certain  acoustic 
belts,  Mr.  Tyndal  reminds  us,  before  or  behind  which  sounds  are 
heard,  of  bell  or  gun,  but  within  which  those  sounds  are  strangely 
inaudible.  But  certainly  some  things  must  be  admitted  as  hav- 
ing been  accomplished  by  or  under  this  system  of  Faith. 

It  can  hardly  be  denied  that  the  general  level  of  moral  life 
has  been  exalted,  since  the  Roman  Empire  absorbed  this  relig- 
ion, and  was  then  broken  into  separate  kingdoms ;  that  life  is 
now,  in  Chiistian  communities,  more  serious,  thoughtful,  ethical 
than  it  was,  more  conscious  of  relations  to  God  and  the  hereafter, 
and  with  a  nobler  force  from  the  Future  raining  upon  it ;  that 
moral  criticism  of  men,  manners,  customs,  arts,  theories,  institu- 
tions, is  vastly  more  searching  and  imperative  than  it  was  before 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  had  been  preached ;  that  no  such  social 
and  moral  state  as  was  supremely  established  at  Rome  has  for 
centuries  been  possible  in  the  compass  of  Christendom  ;  that  the 
ideal  of  character,  as  contemplated  now  by  the  humblest  disciple, 
is  richer  and  purer  than  shines  before  us  on  any  pictured  page 
of  the  poet,  or  fi'om  the  lordliest  speculative  maxims,  of  the 
world  before  Christ ;  that,  at  the  same  time,  the  savage  barba- 
rian is  still  reached  and  redeemed  by  this  spiritual  Faith,  while 
even  the  utterly  vicious  and  abandoned  in  our  own  cities  are 
sought  out  by  it,  and  are  not  unfrequently  reclaimed  and  purified, 
traired  and  transformed,  through  its  unwasting,  intrepid  force  ; 
and  vhat  it  is  no  more  exhausted  of  its  virtue,  or  drained  of  its 
eneq  y,  by  all  the  works  w^hich  it  has  done,  than  is  the  air  by 
the  li  ngs  which  have  breathed  it,  or  the  sunshine  by  the  flowers 
whosi  tints  it  has  brightened,  whose  cups  it  has  filled  with  lovely 
perf  ui  ne. 

It  expects  further  triumphs,  this  religion  of  Jesus :  to  be 
wrought  by  the  same  essential  force  which  has  been  revealed  in 
its  previous  history.  And  it  is  not  to  be  fulfilled,  in  the  plans 
which  it  proposes,  in  the  great  expectations  which  it  inspires, 
till  the  coming  centuries  follow  each  other  in  the  whiteness  of 
holiness,  on  an  earth  filled  with  righteousness  and  love. 

For  one,  I  believe  that  that  time  is  to  come.     More  than 


ON  THE  MORAL  LIFE  OF  MANKIND.  281 

twelve  years  have  passed  since  I  saw  in  the  studio  of  Kaalbach,  \ 
at  Munich,  a  great  cartoon,  whose  vivid  impression  I  have  not 
yet  forgotten.  It  represented  an  early  persecution  at  Eome. 
Upon  the  portico  of  the  palace,  as  I  remember  it,  stood  the 
emperor,  in  the  embroidered  dress  of  a  woman,  with  a  sensual, 
half-vacant  and  half-insane  look,  on  a  face  from  which  still  the 
singular  traces  of  a  fallen  beauty  had  not  disappeared.  Around 
him  were  handsome  and  dissolute  women,  and  beautiful  boys, 
servants  of  his  lust,  or  panders  to  his  frivolous  passion  for  dis- 
pla3%  The  prefect  of  the  city  approached  him  with  servility, 
clapping  his  hands  as  the  sentence  of  death  was  lightly  uttered. 
A  Roman  Senator,  of  the  older  type,  looked  on  from  the  side 
with  haughty  scorn.  The  soldiers,  in  their  scattered  groups, 
were  some  of  them  indignant,  some  wholly  stolid,  and  some  ex- 
ulting, with  greedy  eyes  fastened  upon  the  luxury  which  they 
saw.  On  the  standards  above  blazed  the  motto  "  Divus  Nero ! " 
In  the  foreground,  at  the  side,  was  a  company  of  Christians, 
bound  to  the  stake,  at  the  foot  of  which  already  fires  were  kin- 
dled :  among  them  a  father  kissing  his  child,  with  agony  but  in 
victory,  for  the  last  time.  Peter  was  there,  a  little  apart,  being 
crucified  with  his  head  downward  ;  and  Paul,  in  his  privilege  as 
a  Roman  citizen,  was  thundering  admonition  against  the  terrific 
cruelty  and  lust,  while  a  stalwart  executioner,  with  an  axe  in  his 
hand,  was  laughing  at  him,  with  almost  the  leer  of  an  idiot  on 
his  face.  / 

The  whole  story  which  I  have  rapidly  and  very  imperfectly 
recited  this  evening  was  on  that  terrible  German  canvas.  I 
have  not  seen  it  since  ;  but  it  is  almost  as  present  to  me  now  aa 
are  the  faces  at  this  moment  before  me.  I  do  not  believe  that  that 
supreme  force  which  conquered  then,  against  so  much,  without 
any  assistance  from  politics  or  from  letters,  is  to  leave  its  work 
half-done  in  the  world.  I  expect  for  it  a  future  career  only 
more  illustrious  than  has  yet  been  achieved.  And  even  now,  as 
its  uncompleted  triumphs  are  before  us,  I  match  it  against  ali 
which  philosophy  had  done,  even  that  of  the  Stoics,  who  had 
caught  adumbrations  of  raajestical  truths,  and  who  may  have 
learned  something  from  Hebrew  sources — I  match  it  against  the 
Indian  Buddhism,  which  doubtless  of  all  the  ethnic  religion* 


282  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITY, 

approaches  it  nearest,  in  ethical  maxims  and  in  practical  force, 
but  to  which,  as  Hard  wick  has  said,  *  vice  had  no  intrinsic 
hideousness,  and  virtue  was  only  another  name  for  calculating 
prudence,'  which  therefore,  as  he  affirms,  has  left  the  countries 
which  it  has  possessed  '  the  prey  of  superstition  and  demon- 
worship,  of  political  misrule  and  of  spiritual  lethargy' — I  set 
Christianity  against  either  of  these,  against  anything  else,  and 
then  I  say  that  if  the  power  suddenly  breaking  forth  from  Pal- 
estine on  the  world,  to  work  this  immense  and  salutary  change 
which  history  records,  came  from  man  as  its  source,  and  not 
from  God  using  man  as  His  instrument,  I  shall  not  be  aston- 
ished when  it  is  shown  me  that  the  oceans  have  gushed  from 
the  fountains  at  Kazareth,  or  that  the  planet  itself  was  framed 
in  Judea  I 


LECTURE     IX. 


THE  EFFECT  OF  CHEISTIANITY  ON  THE  WOKLD'S 
HOPE  OF  PROGKESS. 


LECTUKE    IX. 

The  distinct  apprehension  of  the  unity  and  the  eternity  oi 
Ood  appears  indispensable  to  any  vigorous  conviction  of  a  grad- 
ually developed  unity  in  history ;  while  the  recognition  of  the 
wisdom,  the  power,  and  the  character  of  God,  seems  as  indispen- 
sable to  any  just  expectation  of  an  ultimate  benign  and  majestic 
result, — in  which,  after  obstacles  are  overcome,  and  resistances 
are  vanquished,  all  peoples  shall  partake  in  the  consummate 
heauty  and  the  serene  life  of  righteousness  and  of  peace. 

This  is  not  an  unsupported  suggestion  of  religion.  It  is  a 
maxim  of  practical  philosophy,  considering  the  past,  or  investi- 
gating carefully  the  nature  of  man,  with  the  energetic  contend- 
ing forces,  of  reason  and  passion,  which  meet  within  that  in  a 
continually  rekindled  strife.  It  is,  in  fact,  a  necessary  inference 
from  the  manifoldness  of  human  life,  and  the  vast  complexity 
of  affairs  on  the  earth.  There  must  be  a  plan  even  for  a  house, 
that  it  may  be  builded  in  shapely  proportion,  with  halls,  apart- 
ments, fagade,  roof,  and  may  not  remain  a  confused  pile  of  stone 
and  brick,  lumber  and  lime.  There  must  be  a  plan  for  a  mili- 
tary campaign,  that  it  may  not  be  resolved  into  desultory  at- 
tempts of  dissociated  squads ;  that  the  preadjusted  movements 
of  those  furthest  from  the  centre  may  at  last  converge  on  the 
critical  point,  there  to  be  compacted,  with  irresistible  force,  for 
the  conquering  effort.  So,  and  much  more,  there  must  be  some- 
where a  plan  in  history :  which  shall  take  account  of  the  near 
and  the  far  ;  of  the  ancient,  the  modern,  and  even  of  peoples  yet 
to  be  ;  which  shall  recognize  and  regulate  the  moral  forces  which 
build  up  states,  or  which  work  their  decay ;  which  shall  antici- 
pate tendencies,  occasions,  men,  and  take  cognizance  of  arts, 
inventions,  knowledges,  even  before  society  has  reached  them, 
ihai  all  may  be  confederated  in  systematic  inter-action  for  a 

(285) 


2S6  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANITT 

final  effect : — there  must  be  somewhere  such  a  plan,  or  the  entire 
progi-ess  of  mankind  will  be  at  best  uncertain,  fragmental,  with 
an  ever-recurring  tangle  of  confusions  suspending  or  forbidding 
any  orderly  progress  toward  a  foreseen  supreme  result. 

There  must  be  such  a  plan ;  and  the  only  Being  who  can  be 
imagined  to  have  formed  and  to  maintain  it  is  He  who  exists 
from  everlasting,  who  is  infinitely  enamored  of  righteousness 
and  truth,  whom  no  opposition  can  finally  thwart,  and  beneath 
whom  the  most  refractory  wills  are  compelled  to  contribute,  with 
whatever  reluctance,  to  celestial  designs. 

In  the  absence,  then,  of  such  a  positive  and  illuminating  rec- 
ognition of  God,  even  in  philosophy,  still  more  in  the  popular 
religions  of  antiquity,  there  could  be  no  confident  expectation  of 
a  general  and  sure  progress  of  the  race  toward  a  result  of  liberty 
and  light,  beneath  the  permanent  sovereignty  of  a  paramount 
justice.  By  reason  of  the  darkness  in  which  it  was  walking, 
each  nation  was  naturally  egoistic :  with  its  own  gods,  as  with 
its  own  territory ;  with  its  special  traditions,  customs,  rites,  and 
a  worship  connected  with  historical  descent  which  severed  it 
from  others ;  its  language  no  more  peculiar  to  itself  than  was 
its  religion  ;  all  contributing  to  set  it  apart  from  other  peoples,, 
in  an  ambitious  and  hostile  isolation.  The  practical  sense  of  re- 
ciprocal relationships  was  therefore  wanting,  as  I  have  already 
in  a  measure  illustrated,  in  the  ancient  states.  It  was  so,  more 
than  for  any  other  reason,  because  of  their  want  of  a  common 
religion.  Leagues,  or  councils,  like  the  Amphictyonic,  might 
be  established  among  contiguous  tribes,  of  a  common  descent, 
and  thus  substantially  of  a  common  religion.  But  even  these  were 
exceptional ;  and  the  august  predominant  idea  of  the  vital  or- 
ganic  unity  of  the  race  had  quite  passed  away  from  the  prac- 
tical and  governing  thought  of  antiquity.  If  it  continued  at  all, 
it  was  only  as  a  dream  which  haunted  here  and  there  -the 
thoughts  of  philosophers,  and  found  some  faint  unillumined  re- 
flection on  their  passionless  words. 

With  that,  the  thought  of  any  assured  cosmical  progress,  aa 
attainable  or  possible,  had  equally  passed  ;  and  any  clear  outlook 
over  a  future,  in  which  separated  nations  should  dwell  in  char- 
ity, with  a  common  Faith,  and  the  constant  mutual  interchange 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  287 

between  them  of  thoughts  and  of  arts, — this  was  almost  as  im- 
possible to  be  reached,  even  by  spirits  of  rarest  prescience,  under 
the  ancient  limitations,  as  is  the  sight  of  the  ocean  from  the  nar- 
row Swiss  vallej'S,  as  is  to  us,  while  tarrying  for  the  hour  beneath 
this  roof,  the  vision  of  stars  shining  above  it.  There  was  noth- 
ing, there  could  be  nothing,  to  exhilarate  the  spirit  in  the  large 
and  clear  prospect  of  an  ultimate  universal  welfare  of  the  race. 
And  while  there  were  times,  in  many  states,  of  great  prosperity, 
eommercial,  political,  military,  artistic,  at  which  hope  was  buoy- 
ant, plans  were  eager,  and  the  world  seemed  open  to  intrepid 
aspiration,  it  is  to  be  noticed  that  such  passages  of  experience 
came  usually  amid  the  relative  youth  of  a  people ;  that  after 
generations  were  intent  on  conserving,  not  on  augmenting,  what 
had  already  been  attained  ;  and  that  as  the  power  of  others  in- 
creased, or  as  an  inward  decadence  in  themselves  began  to  be 
felt,  of  political  skill  or  martial  ardor,  the  sense  grew  stronger, 
it  came  to  be  pervading,  of  the  insecurity  of  most  vital  institu- 
tions, and  despondency  settled,  with  a  dull  hopelessness  con- 
cerning the  future,  on  each  thoughtful  and  powerful  people. 

Even  in  Homer,  one  is  frequently  impressed  with  the  tone  of 
sadness  beneath  the  exquisite  cadences  of  the  immortal  song,  as 
the  minstrel  sings  of  the  miseries  of  mankind,  of  the  destructive 
wrath  of  the  gods,  smiting  armies  with  swift  arrows,  hurling 
heroic  souls  to  Hades,  and  leaving  their  bodies  a  prey  to  dogs, 
and  birds,  and  crawling  worms ;  as  he  makes  the  skilKul  and 
eloquent  Odysseus  say — whose  personal  courage  no  calamity  can 
conquer — that  the  earth  nourishes  no  animal  weaker  than  man, 
who  looks  for  good,  but  on  whom  the  gods  bring  grievous 
things,  to  be  borne  reluctantly,  with  a  suffering  mind.* 

But  this  was  still  in  the  morning-time  of  letters  and  of  life , 
when  the  plains  lay  sparkling  beneath  the  light  of  the  new-risen 
sun,  and  the  crisp  freshness  of  energetic  and  prophesying  vitality 
seemed  quickening  in  the  air,  and  gaily  reflected  from  shining 
shores.  How  far  the  same  familiar  tone  of  gloomy  contempla- 
tion was  deepened  and  darkened  in  subsequent  time,  I  need 
tiardly  remind  you :  till  in  spite  of  victories,  arts,  eloquence,  in 


Odyssey,  xviir. :  130-135. 


288  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRmTIANlTY 

fepite  of  games  and  splendid  processions,  of  moulded  marbles^,, 
echoing  squares,  unsurpassed  temples,  the  solemn  and  threat- 
ening voice  of  Tragedy  became  the  sombre  dominant  note  ip 
Athenian  culture.  The  early  buoyant  and  aspiring  spirit,  from 
which  that  which  was  stately  and  that  which  was  splendid  had 
prolifically  sprung,  passed  by  degrees  into  conscious  lassitude  and 
disquieting  fear;  and  the  figure  of  the  I^emesis,  daughter  of 
IN'ight,  kindred  in  office  with  Ate  and  the  Eumenides,  represent- 
ing the  avenging  anger  of  the  gods— this  awed  and  shadowed 
the  failing  Greek  will.  Once  conceived  of  as  a  lovely  young  vir- 
gin, she  came  to  be  figured  as  armed  with  a  rod,  with  a  whee* 
at  her  feet,  and  finally  as  winged :  and  the  thought  of  her  fear- 
ful, fateful  power,  brooded  as  a  mystery  of  darkness  over  the 
happiest  human  life.  Even  the  moral  and  religious  elements 
associated  with  her  function  at  length  disappeared,  while  she 
remained  the  author  of  startling  and  unmerited  vicissitudes. 

*  The  gods  hate  the  prosperous ';  out  of  what  a  profound  and 
fruitful  melancholy  that  thought  was  born !  The  downfall  of 
the  strongest  is  but  matter  of  time !  Eevolution  in  the  fortunes 
of  the  state  comes  of  course,  and  the  highest  shall  be  the  most 
debased  !  The  apprehension  of  this  irresistible  fatality,  certain  as 
nightfall,  not  to  be  arrested,  not  to  be  escaped — it  is  this,  surely, 
beyond  anything  else,  which  in  its  majestic  solemnity  constitutes 
the  strongest  moral  appeal  that  the  later  Hellenic  poetry  makes  to 
the  sympathy  of  mankind.  It  is  the  pain  which  attends  the  desper- 
ate struggle  of  prescient  intellect  against  an  overwhelming  Divine 
Power,  which  gives  its  meaning  to  the  Prometheus.  It  is  the 
awful,  inevitable  catastrophe,  which  the  oracle  of  Delphi  cannot 
avert,  which  in  fact  it  ensures,  which  made  the  CEdipus  legend 
so  fascinating.  It  is  the  same  weird  element  of  combined  duty 
and  doom,  and  of  fierce  agony  involving  the  innocent,  which 
imparts  their  immense  pathetic  power  to  the  Antigone  and  the 
Iphigeneia.  As  near  an  approach  to  the  Greek  conception  as  any 
perhaps  in  modern  letters,  is  in  the  sombre  words  of  Goethe,  in 
his  aphorisms  on  Nature :  *  She  tosses  her  creatures  out  of  noth- 
ingness, and  tells  them  not  whence  they  come,  or  whither  they 
go.   .   .   She  wraps  man  in  darkness  and  makes  him  forever  long 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  289 

for  the  light.  She  is  always  building  up  and  destroying;  but 
her  workshop  is  inaccessible.' 

Even  in  Greece,  therefore,  with  all  the  courageous  and  imag- 
inative vivacity  which  belonged  constitutionally  to  the  spirit  of 
the  people,  there  was  no  quickening  or  large  expectation  for  the 
future  of  mankind.  In  later  times  there  was  none  for  the  con- 
4^inued  prosperity  of  either  celebrated  Hellenic  state.  After  the 
£nal  Roman  conquest,  such  an  expectation  had  lost  its  last  chance 
to  get  recognition.  The  whole  temper  of  the  people  was  then 
expressed  in  those  lines  in  the  Greek  anthology,  ascribed  to 
Alpheus,  of  Mitylene,  and  probably  written  in  the  time  of  Au- 
gustus :  "  Shut,  god,  the  unsubdued  gates  of  Olympus ;  guard, 
■Jupiter,  the  holy  citadel  of  the  sky;  for  already  is  the  sea 
brought  by  the  spear  under  the  yoke  of  Rome,  and  the  land 
:also ;  only  the  road  to  heaven  remains  untrodden."  * 

^NTor  was  there  any  more  of  hope  for  the  future  advancing 
progress  of  the  world  among  other  peoples,  outside  of  Palestme, 
In  India,  especially  after  Buddhism  had  appeared — that  strange 
and  energetic  philosophy  of  being,  which  had  such  missionary 
enterprise  in  it,  and  which  had  made  remarkable  conquests  cen- 
turies before  Christ — it  would  seem  that  this  might  have  been 
otherwise,  and  that  the  idea  of  an  ultimate  transformation  of  all 
to  a  Divine  likeness  might  at  least  have  been  accepted  as  a  hope. 
But  no  such  expectation  or  hope  appears.  The  doctrine  of  the 
-transmigration  of  souls  through  successive  bodies,  so  that  the 
prince  might  become  a  worm,  and  the  meanest  of  reptiles  en- 
close the  life  of  him  who  had  marched  at  the  head  of  armies — 
this  doctrine,  rooted  in  the  Hindu  conception,  and  common  to 
both  its  great  religions — forbade  there  any  theoretical  conception 
-of  a  permanent  and  beautiful  progress  in  history.  So  it  came  t«-) 
pass,  as  Frederick  Schlegel  years  ago  pointed  out,  that  in  spito 
of  all  which  there  was  accomplished  in  art  and  jurisprudence, 
while  the  Indian  temples  rival  the  Greek  in  the  fascination  of 
'their  beauty,  and  the  Indian  jurisprudence  is  a  magnificent 
monument  of  early  intellectual  and  moral  refinement,  the  his- 
torical view  is  always  turned  backward  toward  the  past,  and 


*  Greek  Anthology :  Burges's  trans. ;  London  ed.,  1876 :  p.  98. 
19 


290  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIAmTY 

literature  breathes  a  melancholy  regret  for  all  that  man  and  the- 
world  have  lost.  Of  the  final  period  of  the  world  the  Hindu* 
thought,  as  he  affirms,  "as  the  age  of  progressive  misery,  and 
aft  all-prevailing  woe."  * 

There  was  really  only  one  people  on  the  earth,  at  the  time 
when  Christianity  began  to  be  preached,  in  which  might  have 
been  expected  a  different  view  as  to  history  and  its  progress 
The  Egyptians  were  not  likely  to  entertain  such  :  because  they 
shared  in  the  doctrine  of  the  metempsychosis — in  fact  it  has 
been  sometimes  supposed  that  from  them  the  Hindus  had  de- 
rived it — and  because  the  tremendous  political  disasters  which 
had  fallen  upon  them  made  hopefulness  for  the  future  almost 
absurd.  The  great  Pyramid  has  been  treated  by  recent  eager 
and  interesting  essayists  as  a  Divine  standard  of  measures  and 
weights,  supern at u rally  inspired,  though  humanly  builded.  I 
am  not  competent  to  discuss  it  in  that  sense ;  but  certainly  no 
thoughtful  Egyptian  of  the  time  of  the  Master  could  have  looked 
upon  the  pyramids,  or  on  any  of  the  remaining  temples  and 
monuments  at  Memphis  or  at  Thebes,  without  feeling  that,  as 
compared  with  any  genius  still  remaining  on  the  banks  of  the 
Nile,  the  genius  which  had  built  them  was  almost  superhu- 
man ;  without  being  ever  freshly  reminded  of  the  multiplied 
burdens  under  which  the  renowned  and  pow^erful  state  now  stag- 
gered in  w^eakness. 

So  the  vast  Persian  empire  had  collapsed  into  chaos  before^ 
the  destroying  march  of  Alexander ;  and,  after  the  death  of 
Antiochus,  had  succumbed  to  the  swiftly  developed  and  widely 
victorious  Parthian  power.  Its  early  religion  had  recognized 
life  as  a  sore  battle  between  evil  and  good,  but  had  expected  the 
ultimate  triumph  of  the  good  and  its  God.  Those  who  received 
this  had  yearned  for  a  Deliverer ;  and,  we  are  told  by  one  of  the- 
writers  of  the  New  Testament,  had  thought  that  they  saw  from 
the  East  his  star,  at  about  the  time  when  Jesus  was  born.  But 
there  was  left  little  room,  even  in  that  state,  for  any  uplifting 
hope  for  its  future.     It  was  not  till  after  the  spread  of  Christi- 


*  Lects.  on  "  Philosophy  of  History  '':  N.  York  ed.,  1841 ;  Vol.  I. :  pp.  184^ 
219,  228,  230. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  291 

anity.  in  the  age  of  the  Sassanidse,  that  the  figure  of  the  future 
heroic  Benefactor  became  prominent  with  the  Persians  ;  and  tha 
final  expectation  of  him  vanished  when  the  last  of  that  dynasty 
fled  and  fell  before  the  tierce  Mohammedan  A.rabs. 

But  it  might  have  seemed  then — 1  had  almost  said  it  might 
still  seem — that  in  the  vast  and  carefully  organized  Roman 
empire,  so  long  advancing,  in  later  years  so  swiftly  widening, 
compacted  and  secured  as  now  it  appeared  under  a  central  impe- 
rial care,  there  should  be  a  great  expectation  for  the  future  :  a 
pre-vision  of  the  time  when  the  recent  and  ungirt  Parthian 
empire  outlying  on  the  East,  with  the  barbarians  of  the  Korth^ 
the  West,  and  the  South,  should  be  equally  subjected  with 
Egypt  and  Greece  to  that  colossal  and  haughty  Power  which, 
enthroned  on  the  Tiber,  had  flung  out  its  legions  to  every  quar- 
ter, and  had  spread  its  authority,  like  a  mystical  Fate,  across 
many  lands ;  when  one  Law  should  be  everywhere  supreme ; 
when,  in  the  tolei*ance  of  all  religions,  no  further  religious 
quarrel  or  feud  should  vex  mankind  ;  and  when  the  return  of 
the  star-bright  Astrsea,  daughter  of  Themis,  should  bless  again 
with  her  benign  light  the  waiting  race.  This  would  certainly 
have  appeared,  to  those  looking  on  from  without,  a  natural  pre- 
sumption ;  and  doubtless  occasional  intimations  of  this,  or  of 
something  like  this,  are  to  be  found,  as  in  Yirgil's  fourth  eclogue, 
or  in  scattered  verses  of  other  poets.  In  Koman  oratory  it  is 
more  than  once  shown  as  a  wish,  if  not  as  a  hope.  In  the 
common  Roman  feeling,  expectation  of  success  was  so  closely 
associated  with  an  admiring  pride  in  the  past  that  it  could  only 
reluctantly  give  way. 

Yet  Rome  itself,  in  the  time  of  Christ — steady  and  strange  as 
had  been  its  historical  progress,  immense,  confirmed,  and  almost 
unquestioned,  as  was  then  its  admitted  supremacy — Rome  itself 
was  rather  haunted  by  disturbing  apprehensions  than  inspired 
by  expectant  and  confident  hope;  was  burdened  with  a  sense  of 
inward  decline,  which  in  sensitive  spirits  became  almost  crush- 
ing, and  which  made  the  future  to  such  not  so  much  uncertain 
as  appalhng.  The  Greek  Polybius — statesman,  historian,  phi- 
losopher, philanthropist — two  centuries  before  the  day  of  St, 
Paul,  had  given  a  picture  of  Roman  life  while  still  in  its  sim- 


292  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

plicity,  and  had  attributed  the  strength  of  the  state  to  the  rehg 
ious  reverence  and  faith  by  which  its  people  were  distinguished 
Men  felt,  afterward,  that  with  the  failure  of  this  ancient  religious* 
ness  the  state  was  imperilled,  and  calamities  were  imminent ;  yet 
the  old  religion  could  not  be  restored  to  its  former  authority. 
The  very  oracles  were  ceasing.  Strabo  said  that  they  were 
oppressed  by  the  general  contempt ;  and  Cicero,  in  his  treatise 
on  Divination,  attempts  an  explanation  of  why  the  oracle  at 
Delphi,  formerly  so  renowned,  had  ceased  to  give  any  truthful 
and  useful  counsel  to  men. 

Pausanias  contrasted  the  time  of  old,  when  men  in  piety  walked 
with  the  gods  and  were  guests  at  their  tables,  with  his  own 
time,  when  wickedness  had  come  to  be  supreme  in  the  city  and 
the  land.  As  early  as  the  sixth  year  of  our  era,  while  Jesus  was 
fitill  a  child  at  IN'azareth,  it  had  become  almost  impossible  to  find 
maidens  willing  to  be  chosen  as  Yestal  Virgins,  or  parents  will- 
ing to  yield  their  daughters  to  this  most  famous  ancient  service. 
Augustus  tried,  almost  in  vain,  to  overcome  the  resisting  reluc- 
tance ;  and  the  office  had  to  be  opened  to  those  whose  parents 
had  at  some  time  been  slaves.  Afterward,  a  rich  pecuniary 
gratuity  was  assigned  to  one  joining  the  sacred  company  ;  and 
the  emperor's  mother  took  a  place  among  them  at  the  theatre, 
to  add  whatever  of  honor  she  might  to  the  waning  prestige  of 
their  office.  This  was  only  a  significant  symptom  of  the  general 
inward  decay  of  faith  in  the  ancient  religion.  And  so,  even  as 
early  as  that — when  the  empire  appeared  most  masterful  and 
secure,  as  well  as  most  splendid,  when  the  city  of  brick  was  fast 
becoming  a  city  of  marble,  and  when  the  brilliant  Augustan  age 
was  crowning  with  intellectual  attainments  the  long  preceding 
periods  of  strength,  seeking,  like  Pheidias  in  his  statue  of 
Athene,  to  add  plates  of  ivory,  robes  of  gold,  to  the  stony 
hardness  underneath — the  apprehension  of  disaster  was  widely 
diffused. 

There  had  been  an  ancient  traditional  prediction,  mentioned 
by  Dio  Cassius,  that  *  when  thrice  three  hundred  years  should 
have  passed,'  Home  should  perish  ;  and  Juvenal  makes  a  Ro- 
man say  that  '  the  ninth  age  is  now  running  its  course,  and 
?an  era  baser  than  the  days  of  Iron ;  for  whose  iniquity  nature 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  ROPE  OF  PROGRESS.  293 

has  no  name,  and  with  which  she  shows  no  metal  for  com- 
parison.'* The  famous  writings  attributed  to  Sibylla,  and 
allowed  by  the  Senate  for  many  years  before  Christ  to  have 
augural  authority,  had  in  them  frequent  predictions  of  disaster. 
Cities  were  bidden  to  continue  for  the  present  to  orna- 
ment themselves  with  temples  and  stadiums,  with  market- 
places and  golden  images,  but  assured  that  they  should  come  to 
the  bitter  day.  It  was  distinctly  declared  that  Dikd,  Justice,  as 
ruler,  should  cast  the  things  heaven-high  to  the  gi'ound,  that  all 
oracles  should  come  to  an  end,  and  that  Rome  should  be  ruin.f 
Even  the  gay,  musical,  convivial  Horace,  practical  and  playful 
in  his  customary  song,  exclaims  in  his  second  ode  :  *  Whom  of 
the  gods  shall  the  people  call  to  assist  the  affairs  of  the  perish- 
ing empire  ?  With  what  prayers  shall  the  sacred  virgins  weary 
Yesta,  now  little  attentive  to  their  hymns?  To  whom  shall  Ju- 
piter  give  the  task  of  expiating  our  wickedness  ? '  In  another 
ode  he  breaks  into  even  passionate  prophecy  of  disaster:  "An- 
other age  is  now  worn  out  with  civil  wars,  and  Rome  is  ruined 
by  her  own  strength  !  What  neither  the  bordering  Marsi  were 
able  to  destroy,  nor  the  Etrurian  band  of  threatening  Porsena,. 
nor  the  envious  valor  of  Capua,  nor  Spartacus  the  bold,  nor  the 
faithless  Allobroges  eager  for  new  things  ;  what  neither  fierce 
Germany  subdued,  with  its  blue-eyed  youth,  nor  Hannibal,  de- 
tested by  parents — this  we  shall  destroy,  an  impious  generation 
of  doomed  blood ;  and  the  land  shall  again  be  occupied  by  wild 
beasts.  The  barbarian  conqueror  shall  tread  upon  the  ashes  of 
the  city,  and  the  horseman  shall  make  it  reverberate  with  the 
resounding  hoof."  J  In  the  Secular  Ode,  written  at  the  request 
of  Augustus,  a  few  years  before  the  birth  of  Jesus,  he  seems 
expressly  to  restrict  the  future  conditional  prosperity  of  Rome 
to  the  Latin  territory. 

Augustus,  becoming  Pontifex  Maximus,  seized  and  burned 
two  thousand  volumes  of  the  so-called  prophetical  writings,  re- 
taining only  a  selection  to  be  deposited  in  gilded  cojffers  in  the 
temple  of  Apollo.     He  sought  thus  to  arrest  the  propagation  ot 


*  Sat.  xni. ;  28-30.  t  Sibyl.  Orac.  in. :  67-60 :  860-4. 

JEpod. :  XVI.:  1-12. 


294  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

fears  among  the  people;  but  his  success  was  very  lirnited.  In 
the  days  of  Mariiis,  occurrences  deemed  ominous  had  startled 
men's  souls.  Cicero  had  elaborately  recounted  in  verse  portents 
appearing  in  his  time,  and  believed  to  threaten  the  state  :  con- 
currences of  fiery  coiistellations  ;  comets,  tremulous  with  flame  ; 
terrible  forms  seen  in  the  night-time ;  lightning  flashing  fatally 
out  of  clear  sides,  or  at  another  time  smiting  the  bronze  statue  of 
the  wolf  of  Mars,  and  of  the  children  suckled  by  her ;  and  he  spe- 
cially mentions  the  many  soothsayers,  pouring  their  oracles  over 
the  land,  from  furious  breasts.*  To  similar  portents  Dio  Cassius 
refers,  adding  a  total  eclipse  of  the  sun  at  about  the  time  when 
the  war  between  Caesar  and  Pompey  was  commencing,  and  a 
fiery  crown,  with  pointed  rays,  surrounding  the  sun,  in  the  year 
following  Caesar's  death.f  Yirgil  commemorates  the  fearful 
prodigies  of  the  same  period  in  one  of  the  Georgics.:j:  So  Sue- 
tonius, afterward,  records  the  sudden  appearance  of  a  circle  like 
a  rainbow  around  the  sun,  in  a  clear  and  bright  sky,  followed  by 
a  thunderbolt  which  smote  the  tomb  of  Julia,  Caesar's  daughter ;  § 
and  Tacitus  mentions  the  repeated  earthquakes,  with  the  failure 
of  provisions  in  the  year  51  after  Christ,  with  birds  of  ill  omen 
perching  on  the  Capitol,  and  the  fright  of  the  multitude  who  in 
their  panic  trampled  on  the  infirm,  regarding  the  condition  of 
things  as  oniinous. 

One  is  sometimes  impressed,  even  in  the  earlier  Eoman  history, 
by  a  certain  sombre  and  mournful  tone,  as  well  as  by  a  haughty 
strength,  in  the  character  and  the  action  of  that  memorable 
people.  They  reckoned  time,  it  has  well  been  said,  by  nights 
not  by  days ;  and  the  dial  bearing  upon  its  plate  the  inscrip- 
tion, '  I  count  no  hours  but  the  cloudless '  — '  non  numero 
horas  nisi  Serenas ' — which  to  the  Yenitian  or  Neapolitan  of  our 
time  would  seem  so  fitting,  must  have  appeared  the  least  suit- 
able of  instruments  for  measuring  the  progress  of  the  high, 
heroic,  but  often  shaded  and  stormy  days  of  Eoman  progress. 
But  now  the  stately  solemnity  and  strength  seemed  to  have 
fiadly  disappeared,  or  only  to  survive  in  limited  circles,  while 


*  De  Dlvin&t.  I. :  11,  12.  t  xlv.  :  17. 

X  Georg.  I. :  466-492.  §  Oct.  August. :  xcv. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  295 

■riot  and  revel,  alternating  naturally  with  boding  fear,  had  come 
in  their  place.  For  hundreds  of  years  this  impression  of  terror 
at  anything  unusual  continued  upon  men.  The  effect  was  with 
some  to  lead  them  to  turn  anywhere  for  a  Faith  which  the 
trembling  of  the  planet  could  not  disturb,  to  which  meteors  were 
but  signs  of  a  Divine  watchfulness,  and  which  was  not  afraid  of 
ominous  birds;  but  it  was,  with  most,  morbidly  to  intensify 
heathen  fanaticism,  and  to  make  the  spread  of  the  new  religion 
more  difficult  and  perilous.  Calamities  felt,  or  calamities 
dreaded,  bred  only  a  fiercer  hostility  to  the  Christians.  One 
may  almost  measure  the  energy  and  the  extent  of  the  public 
foreboding  by  the  outrages  which  the  disciples  of  the  Master 
had  to  suffer. 

Lucretius,  in  one  passage  of  his  famous  essay  on  the  nature  of 
things,  in  trying  to  explain  an  alleged  fact  that  the  water  in 
wells  is  sometimes  warmer  in  winter  than  in  summer,  supposes 
certain  seeds  of  fire  to  be  lodged  in  the  earth,  which  under  the  sun- 
shine are  drawn  forth,  but  which  in  the  night,  or  in  the  winter, 
being  repressed  by  the  cold,  are  forced  to  descend  into  the  water.* 
In  like  manner,  one  may  almost  literally  say,  the  seeds  of  fi[erco 
persecuting  tire  lay  always  in  the  Roman  life;  but  amid  the 
splendor  of  a  constant  success,  those  seeds  were  dormant,  or 
seemed  to  be  exhaled,  so  that  even,  monotheism  had  its  liberty 
at  Eome.  But  as  the  night  of  fear  drew  on,  and  the  dreadful 
winter  of  discontent,  those  seeds  struck  down  into  the  popular 
temper  and  will — and  the  fruit  of  them  was  the  blazing  pile  in 
which  stood  the  Christians,  since  whose  appearance  the  calami- 
ties had  fallen,  and  in  whose  presence  it  was  vaguely  felt  that 
the  conquering  empire  could  not  stand.  The  passionate  ferocity- 
expressed  and  intensified  a  new  and  dread  element  of  fanat- 
ical unreason,  which  more  and  more  was  perverting  and  inflam- 
ing the  ])opular  spirit  in  regard  to  all  unseen  Powers.  The  belief 
in  magic  became  popular  and  wide.  Soothsayers,  astrologers,  were 
■consulted  not  only  by  the  ignorant  but  by  the  rich,  and  by  em- 
perors. Even  Cicero,  in  his  time,  spoke  respectfully  of  astrology, 
as  cultivated  by  the  Chaldeans  and  Egyptians.!     Tiberius  waa 


*  De  Rer.  Nat.  L.  VI. :  840-848.  t  De  Divinat.  I. :  1. 


296  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

sard  to  be  addicted  to  it.*  "When  a  swarm  of  bees  settled  in 
the  Capitol,  near  the  statue  of  Hercules,  five  years  before  the 
death  of  Cicero,  it  was  solemnly  decreed  that  the  temples  of  Isia 
and  Serapis  at  Rome  should  be  destroyed,  as  being  possibly  con- 
nected with  the  prodigy.f  Ever  lower  and  lower  sank  the  old 
proud  self-reliance,  until  women  and  children  were  cut  open 
alive  in  the  palace  of  Galerius,  that  their  entrails  might  be  in- 
spected for  their  promise  of  the  future.  It  really  looked,  for 
long  periods  of  time,  as  if,  to  use  the  words  of  Uhlhorti,  "  the 
splendor  of  the  ancient  world  was  about  to  end  in  a  Witches*^ 
Sabbath  " !  J 

How  immediate  and  how  immense  is  the  contrast  when  wo- 
tui-n  from  all  this  to  the  hope  inspired  by  the  strong  Hebrew 
Faith,  and  still  more  by  the  Christian,  concerning  the  advancing 
ages  of  the  world  !  In  their  circumstances,  there  is  something- 
surprising  and  significant  in  this  hope  among  the  Hebrews. 

A  comparatively  small  people,  as  matched  against  Egyptian^ 
Assyrian,  Macedonian  empires — in  the  same  comparison  an  un« 
prosperous  people,  not  fertile  in  invention,  debarred  from  wide- 
commerce,  if  by  nothing  else,  by  their  want  of  inviting  and  ac- 
cessible coasts — shut  up  chiefl}^  on  a  tongue  of  land  of  less  than- 
the  area  of  the  state  of  Vermont,  which  was  cut  across  with  deep 
ravines,  and  suitable  only  for  farms  and  flocks — acquiring  prop- 
erties sufficient  to  be  desired  but  never  to  be  envied  by  their 
w^ealthier  neighbors,  and  by  the  very  conditions  of  their  terri-- 
tory  naturally  secluded  from  other  countries,  while  occupying, 
through  what  they  esteemed  a  Providential  allotment,  a  central 
position  among  the  nations — they  had  really  had  only  one  brief 
■period  of  any  special  prominence  or  power,  as  these  are  reckoned 
in  the  records  of  states,  in  the  reign  of  David,  and  especially  of 
Solomon,  his  less  fervent  but  more  accomplished  and  brilliant 
successor.  Immediately  after,  the  unity  of  the  nation  had  been 
fatally  broken  ;  and  after  a  time  the  larger  and  stronger  section 
of  it,  ha\ing  lost  their  early  reverence  for  the  Law,  and  become 


*  Suetonius :  Tiberius :  lxix.  t  Dio  Caes.  xlti. 

\  **  Conflict  of  Christianity,''  etc.:  New  York  ed.,  1879  :  p*  334 


OJSr  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  297 

infected  with  lascivious  idolatries,  had  been  swept  into  an  exile 
from  which  there  were  few  returning  steps.  The  tribes  retain 
ing  Jenisaleiri  as  their  centre  had  suffered  under  profligate  and 
idolatrous  kings,  had  often  themselves  relapsed  in  large  measure 
into  a  heathenism  which  allured  and  defiled  them,  had  seen 
the  house  of  David  on  Zion,  and  even  the  Temple  of  God  on 
Moriah,  the  scene  of  frightful  conspiracies  and  nmrders,  had  at 
last  themselves  been  hurled  into  exile — their  distinctive  exist- 
ence apparently  utterly  merged  and  lost  amid  theVast  popula- 
tions, the  dazzling  riches,  and  the  military  strength  of  the  grand- 
est and  wealthiest  of  the  capitals  of  the  world. 

They  had  there  been  detained  through  more  than  the  life-time  of 
two  generations ;  and  had  finally  been  sent  back  by  the  conqueror 
of  Babylon,  in  utmost  weakness,  poverty,  dependence,  to  begin 
again,  on  their  ancient  seats,  amid  the  wrecks  of  palace  and 
temple,  of  burned  gates  and  broken  walls,  their  historical  life. 
Even  then  they  had  suffered  terrific  calamities,  under  Egyptian 
invasions,  under  the  Syrian  sweep  of  Antiochus  Epiphanes,  in 
the  fierce  struggle  of  the  Maccabees,  till  the  Roman  power  had 
conquered  them  utterly,  and  the  Roman  legionaries  looked  down 
froln  Antonia  on  the  Temple  in  which  an  altar  to  Jupiter  had 
once  been  set  up,  with  swine's  flesh  offered  upon  it,  and  in 
which  a  statue  of  the  Emperor  Caligula  was  afterward  ordered 
to  be  enthroned. 

If  any  people  on  earth  might  seem  at  liberty  to  be  hopeless 
of  the  future,  it  was  certainly  this  people.  If  in  any  the  expec- 
tation of  something  grand  and  benign  to  be  attained  in  coming 
centuries  might  seom  absurd,  this  was  the  one.  And  yet  in  this 
people,  from  first  to  last,  had  been  the  confident  assurance  of  a 
vast  and  bright  future,  reserved  for  them,  and,  through  their 
ministry,  for  all  the  rejoicing  and  reconciled  peoples  of  the 
world.  It  had  not  failed  when  on  the  distant  banks  of  the  Eu- 
phrates the  willows  held  their  silent  harps,  and  tears  choked  the 
songs  of  Zion.  It  had  not  failed  when  the  hosts  of  Alexander 
swept  over  their  country,  with  no  more  apprehension  of  resist- 
ance from  them  than  we  should  have  of  opposition  by  sparrow? 
to  the  rush  of  a  train  along  the  rails.  It  did  not  fail  whec 
Ptolemy  carried  them  by  scores  of  thousands  into  a  new  south 


298  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANlTY 

ern  exile  and  bondage.  It  had  not  failed  when  Antiochus  Third 
was  forced  to  cede  the  land  to  Egypt,  or  when  the  temple  was 
plundered  and  desecrated  by  his  rapacious  and  yicious  son.  It 
did  not  fail  when  Judea  became  a  Roman  province,  and  w^hen 
Crassus  plundered  the  temple  again,  with  a  hand  more  unsparing 
than  that  of  Epiphanes.  It  had  never  failed;  and  it  did  not 
utterly  give  way  when,  in  sight  of  the  generation  which  suc- 
ceeded the  crucifixion  of  Jesus,  Jerusalem  was  destroyed,  in  a 
lire  that  was  almost  itself  quenched  in  simultaneous  torrents  of 
blood,  and  when  the  armies  of  Titus — marching  in,  as  he  is  said 
to  have  felt,  under  a  power  unseen  and  supernal — carried  the 
wretched  remnant  of  population  which  had  not  been  massacred 
into  remote  and  bitter  slavery.  Broken,  hated,  ground  to  pow- 
der, flung  into  exile,  counted  as  less  than  the  dust  of  the  balance, 
whatever  anywhere  yet  survived  of  this  amazing  and  indomitable 
people  retained  the  robust  and  indestructible  hope  which  had 
been  the  impulse  of  the  life  of  their  Fathers. 

It  had  come  from  their  religion  :  in  which  law  and  promise 
had  been  closely  combined — the  law,  to  impress  the  idea  of  God, 
and  to  educate  them  for  His  service  and  honor ;  the  promise,  to 
open  before  their  view  the  future  from  the  first  contemplated 
by  Him,  in  which  the  earth  should  be  the  home  of  His  redeemed 
and  praising  people.  Not  only  had  ardent  and  eminent  prophets 
appeared  among  them,  recognized  by  them  as  Divinely  in- 
structed, predicting  such  an  issue  of  history.  Their  whole  ex- 
traordinary career  had  to  them  been  a  prophecy,  *  not  fulfilled 
punctually,'  as  Bacon  says,  but  having  '  springing  and  germinant 
accomplishment  throughout  many  ages.'  The  peculiar  Messianic 
doctrine  of  the  Hebrews  was  not  something  theoretic  and  inert, 
or  adscititious.  It  was  involved  in  all  their  system  :  a  vital, 
o^herent,  energetic  discovery  of  One  who  was  to  come,  greater 
than  David,  wiser  than  Solomon,  holier  than  most  eminent  saint 
or  seer,  a  royal  Deliverer  and  Lord  to  his  people.  It  was  im- 
bedded  in  institutions,  not  merely  articulated  in  words.  It 
flashed  before  the  eye  through  offices  and  symbols,  as  well  as 
on  illustrious  verbal  predictions ;  and  the  hope  inspired  by  it 
was  not  pale  and  colorless,  but  glowing,  radiant,  round  about 
their  hearts  and  their  state  as  a  bended  rainbow  '  like  unto  an 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  299 

emerald.'  It  has  been  truly  said  by  Kenan,  that  '  what  more 
than  all  else  characterized  the  Jew,  was  his  confident  belief  in  a 
brilliant  and  happy  future  for  humanity.' 

It  was  because  he  saw  a  God,  holy,  wise,  and  of  sovereign 
might,  who  exercised  moral  government  in  the  world,  whose 
providence  followed  a  moral  order,  and  to  whom  the  circle  of 
centuries  was  a  day,  that  he  discovered  this  light  above,  however 
masked  in  enveloping  clouds,  and  did  not  doubt  that  in  the  end 
the  Divine  kingdom  would  infold  the  whole  earth,  or  that  in  it 
all  tribes  of  mankind  would  be  blessed. 

The  most  vehement  sceptic  must  admit  this.  Indeed,  he 
sometimes  ascribes  so  much  to  this  waiting  attitude  of  the  Jew- 
ish mind  as  to  afiirm  that  by  reason  of  the  appeal  which  Jesus 
made,  whether  unconsciously  or  of  purpose,  to  such  an  intense 
and  eager  expectation,  the  early  successes  of  his  religion  may  be 
fairly  explained,  and  the  marvellous  reports  of  him  which  took 
permanence  in  the  Gospels ;  that  through  its  undisceming  and 
passionate  impulse,  he,  being  a  man,  was  transformed,  by  the 
almost  creative  enthusiasm  of  those  who  received  him,  into  a 
Being  more  celestial  than  angels.  I  do  not  so  interpret  the 
facts.  The  picture  of  the  Christ  presented  in  the  Gospels  appears 
singularly  temperate,  harmonious,  self-demonstrative ;  and  the 
only  effect  of  the  vast  and  bright  expectation  of  the  Jews  con- 
cerning their  Messiah,  on  him  who  certainly  professed  to  come 
as  a  Heavenly  messenger,  appears  to  have  been  that  he  entered 
the  race  as  an  obscure  babe,  not  as  one  of  princely  rank  ;  that 
he  put  aside  the  temptation  to  win  the  world  by  the  majesty  of 
power  ;  that  he  hid  the  might  to  which  miracles  were  attributed 
under  human  muscles  ;  that  when  he  was  transfigured,  according 
to  the  story,  he  took  but  three  companions  with  him,  the  same 
who  were  soon  to  be  with  him  in  his  anguish ;  and  that  when 
he  left  the  impression  on  the  disciples  of  a  supernatural  ascen- 
sion from  the  earth,  he  called  only  those  already  attached  to 
him  to  the  astonishing  spectacle.  I  find  the  expectation  of  the 
Jews  recognized  by  Jesus,  at  each  step  on  his  path  ;  but  pre- 
cisely so  recognized  that  the  kingship  promised  should  be  seen 
to  be  that  of  a  spiritual  Teacher,  the  lordship  of  the  world  to 
be  that  which  belongs  to  "  the  Lamb  that  was  slain." 


300  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHBmTIANITT 

The  development  of  this  earlier  system,  which  had  nourished 
such  tenacious  and  indestructible  hope,  was  closed  indeed  in  the 
coming  of  Christianity.  But,  as  another  has  said,  ^  it  died  in 
hope.'  It  handed  on  this  legacy,  at  least,  to  that  which  came 
after :  when  '  those  innumerable  threads  of  golden  light  that  nin 
through  all  the  annals  of  the  Hebrew  nation  met  harmoniously 
in  Him,'  to  whom  from  the  first  they  had  been  pointing.*  Not 
out  of  the  Hebrew  system,  but  as  sublimely  super-imposed  on 
its  antique  strength,  appeared  the  Faith  first  uttered  in  Galilee  ; 
and  while  it  was  heir  to  all  that  had  been  best  in  the  progress  of 
the  past,  it  was  heir,  above  all,  to  this  majestic  and  unfailing 
hope.  Whoever  else  had  desponded  before,  the  Hebrew  had  not, 
because  ho  saw,  or  thought  he  saw,  the  God  Everlasting  the 
defender  of  the  people  which  inherited  His  law ;  because  he  saw, 
or  thought  he  saw,  that  while  they  clung  to  Him  in  faith,  or 
when  they  turned  to  Him  in  repentant  consecration  after  sin^ 
the  whole  power  of  the  world  would  be  insufficient  to  destroy 
their  vital  national  identity,  or  to  forbid  their  future  to  be  ful- 
filled. Whoever  else  might  despond  or  despair,  in  after-time, 
the  Christian  could  not :  because  he  stood  amid  the  consumma- 
tion of  lines  of  history,  to  him  at  least  vivid  and  august  with 
prediction  and  miracle  ;  because  the  God,  gracious  and  just,  was 
now  manifested  to  him  as  never  before,  by  the  Lord  who  had 
declared  Him  ;  because  so  unique  and  so  powerful  an  instru- 
ment for  the  welfare  of  mankind  had  been  entrusted  to  his^ 
hands;  because — to  his  imagination,  if  you  please,  but  as  I  think 
more  truly  and  deeply  to  his  heart — the  Heavens  seemed  alive 
with  helps  and  helpers  for  man's  redemption.  To  his  on-look- 
ing and  stimulated  spirit,  the  new  religion  held  in  it  the  assur- 
ance of  better  ages.  He  walked,  as  of  course,  amid  Romans,. 
Syrians,  Egyptians,  Greeks,  with  the  light  as  of  the  morning- 
star  on  forehead  and  face. 

Yet  it  may  seem  that  at  first  this  could  scarcely  have  been  ; 
because  we  know  that  many  of  the  earlier  disciples  expected  the 
coming  of  Christ  as  Judge,  in  the  Parousia,  as  not  distant  in 
time,  and  could  hardly  have  had  large  or  exalting  expectation* 


*  Hard  wick  :  "  Christ,  and  other  Masters  ":  London  ed.,  1882-  p.  109. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  301 

of  future  cycles  of  advancing  earthly  wisdom  and  peace.  But 
this  expectation  of  the  speedy  visible  advent  of  the  Lord  wag 
itself  but  a  refracted  imagef  of  that  assurance  of  his  final  and  cer- 
tain supremacy  in  the  world  which  was  inspired  by  all  that  thej 
believed.  In  its  more  crude  and  unspiritual  form  it  seems  hardly 
to  have  been,  at  any  time,  a  part  of  the  governing  Faith  of  the 
•church.  It  was,  rather,  the  attractive  resource  of  the  perplexed, 
when  savagely  smitten  by  the  powers  of  the  world.  After  the 
terrific  destruction  of  Jerusalem,  in  which  the  tremendous  pro- 
phetic denunciations  uttered  by  the  Master  appeared  to  his  fol- 
lowers to  have  had  their  evident  primary  fulfilment,  the  time  of 
his  final  coming  for  Judgment  was  remotely  postponed  in  the 
common  expectation  ;  while  the  subsequent  chiliastic  specula- 
tions, tinged  with  Judaism  if  not  springing  from  it,  and  after- 
ward associated  with  the  Montanist  errors,  though  accepted  by 
such  distinguished  teachers  as  Justin  ]\lartyr,  TertuUian,  Lac- 
tantius,  and  others,  did  not  intimately  penetrate  or  permanently 
control  the  common  spirit  and  hope  of  the  church. 

After  a  time,  as  Christianity  grew  stronger  in  its  grasp  upon 
men,  and  as  its  surpassing  spiritual  competence  for  astonishing 
effects  became  more  apparent,  the  expectation  grew  to  be  gen- 
eral that  it  was  to  conquer  the  Roman  empire  by  the  Divine 
energy  inhering  in  it,  or  silently  and  supremely  associated  with 
it,  without  aid  from  a  visible  intervention  of  the  Christ.  The 
expectation  naturally  followed  that  on  similar  terms  it  was  at 
last  to  conquer  the  earth,  and  that  in  that  all  prophecies  of  the 
past  should  be  at  length  supremely  fulfilled.  The  end  of  the 
world  was  still  regarded  as  not  far  distant,  but  the  conquests  of 
the  Gospel  were  expected  to  precede  this,  preparing  the  way 
for  the  grand  consummation.  And  so  it  was  that,  as  has  been 
eloquently  said,  '  the  great  Christian  Fathers  laid  anew  the 
foundations  of  the  world  while  they  thought  that  its  walls  were 
tottering  to  the  fall,  and  that  they  already  saw  the  fires  of  Judg- 
ment through  the  chinks.'  * 

Origen,  *  the  Adamantine,'  was  among  the  first,  no  doubt,  to 


*  J.  H.  Newman:  "Historical  Sketches'":  London  ed.,  1873,  Vol.  II. 
p.  437. 


302  THE  EFFECT  OP  GHRmTIANlTY 

announce  this  final  victory  of  the  Gospel ;  though,  in  substance 
of  doctrine,  others  had  probably  preceded  him.  Jerome^ 
Augustine,  and  those  who  followed,  made  it  the  prevalent  doc- 
trine of  Christendom.  Each  Christian  disciple,  even  at  the 
beginning,  but  more  as  his  religion  widened  in  the  world,  had 
the  sense  of  sharing  in  a  certain  glorious  corporate  life,  the  life 
of  the  great  kingdom  of  disciples  which  the  Lord  had  established  ; 
and  this,  almost  as  by  necessity  of  logic,  carried  on  his  thoughts 
to  the  unreached  future,  as  the  scene  of  its  victorious  extension. 
So  he  rose  to  a  point  of  anticipation  which  philosopher  or  states- 
man had  not  attained.  Plato  himself,  with  all  his  insight  and 
clear  intuition,  had  had  no  conception  of  any  ultimate  goal  in 
history.  The  Stoics  expected  the  destruction  of  existing  things 
on  the  planet,  either  by  fire  or  by  flood,  and  the  commencement 
of  a  new  order  of  history.  Marcus  Aurelius  expressed  the  feel- 
ing of  the  best  part  of  Paganism,  when  he  said,  in  substance, 
'  things  are  repeated  over  and  over,  from  eternity  ';  *  whatever 
happens,  or  is  to  happen,  has  in  fact  already  been.  It  is  only 
the  same  show  repeated.'  But  the  thought  of  progress,  toward 
an  end  Divinely  contemplated,  by  agencies  of  new  and  tran- 
scendent effectiveness,  this  was  common  to  Christians ;  aiid  it 
** formed  the  contrast,"  as  iJ^eander  has  said,  "between  the 
Christian  view  of  life,  and  the  Pagan  notion  of  a  circle  aimlessly 
repeating  itself  by  a  blind  law  of  necessity."  * 

So  it  was  that  as  the  early  sense  of  weakness  and  exposure, 
under  the  sword  of  infuriated  power,  gave  place  to  this  intimate 
governing  consciousness  of  a  sovereign  and  beneficent  purpose  in 
history,  and  of  the  wholly  incalculable  strength  of  the  novel  in- 
strument prepared  to  assist  it,  the  expectation  of  advancing 
success,  in  whatever  concerned  the  true  welfare  of  the  world, 
grew  always  stronger.  E"o  matter  what  particular  application 
we  give  to  passages  of  the  Apocalypse,  or  when  or  by  whom  we 
conceive  it  to  have  been  written,  it  cannot  be  denied  that  its 
theme  is  of  victory :  of  heavenly  agencies  striking  down  upon 
the  tribes  and  tumults  of  the  earth,  and  making  their  immeas- 
urable impact  upon  human  affairs  in  the  interest  of  him  who 


*  '*  History  of  the  Church  "  :  Boston  ed.,  1851 :  Vol.  I.  :  p.  649. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  303 , 

was  slain  upon  Calvary.  In  this  '  high  and  stately  tragedy,'  ai 
Milton  called  it,  '  shutting  up  and  intermingling  its  solemn 
scenes  and  acts  with  a  seven-fold  chorus  of  hallelujahs  and  harp, 
ing  symphonies,'  *  are  simply  outlined,  in  colossal  figures,  the 
crash  of  conflict  through  which  the  world  is  to  be  borne  at  last 
to  the  peace  and  the  splendor  of  the  City  of  God.  If  wholly 
human,  it  expressed  and  illustrated,  while  it  powerfully  moulded, 
the  supreme  feeling  and  thought  of  the  church  in  the  earlier 
centuries.  To  these  who  held  it  inspired  of  God,  and  humanly 
to  be  ascribed  to  the  beloved  disciple,  it  brought  the  power  as  of 
tinother  theophany  to  assure  them  of  the  future. 

As  soon  as  it  was  felt,  too,  as  it  early  was  felt,  that  the  new 
religion  not  only  surpassed,  but  could  use  for  its  furtherance, 
whatever  had  been  best  in  even  the  literature  of  Greece  or  of 
Eome — as  was  vigorously  afiirmed  and  practically  illustrated  by 
Justin  Martyr,  for  example,  or  by  Clement  of  Alexandria ;  as 
soon  as  it  was  felt,  as  it  was  already  felt  when  the  remarkable 
epistle  to  Diognetus  was  written,  in  the  time  perhaps  of  Trajan, 
while  Christianity  was  still  a  novelty  in  the  world,  that '  what 
the  soul  is  in  the  body,  that  Christians  are  in  the  world,'  diffused 
throughout  it  but  not  of  it,  invisible,  watchful,  holding  the  in- 
closing  body  together,  dwelling  in  the  corruptible,  but  looking 
always  for  incorruption ;  above  all,  as  soon  as  it  was  seen  that 
persecution  itself  could  not  arrest  the  advancing  Christianity, 
nor  even  those  licentious  pleasures  the  fear  of  losing  which,  as 
Tertullian  said,  kept  men  from  accepting  the  new  religion  who 
were  not  afraid  of  losing  lifef — ^then  the  assurance  of  a  future 
for  the  world,  of  holiness  and  of  glory,  to  be  wrought  by  this 
transcendent  Faith,  and  to  ultimate  in  the  universal  dominion 
of  Christian  pureness  and  Christian  pea'ce,  came  forth  in  full 
energy.  The  martyrs  were  sustained  by  it.  The  ample  accounts 
given  by  Eusebius  and  by  Cyprian  of  their  sufferings  and  deaths 
throb  with  the  general  and  indomitable  sense  of  the  glory  of 
him  for  whom  they  suffered,  whom  alone  they  would  worship, 
and  of  whose  kingdom  there  should  be  no  end.     The  vision 


♦Prose  Works:  London  ed.,  1753  :  VoL  L:  p.  63. 
fDe  Spectaculis  :  c.  2, 


304  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

which  came  to  Perpetua  in  the  darkness  of  the  dungeon,  of  a 
golden  ladder  stretching  up  into  heaven,  with  swords,  spears, 
and  knives  on  the  sides,  and  with  a  dragon  at  the  foot,  but  at  the 
top  a  lovely  garden,  where  the  Good  Sho{>hGrd  was  waiting  to  re- 
ceive her,  this  was  a  vision  which  others  had  for  the  future  of 
the  world,  as  well  as  of  the  soul,  in  which  Christ  was  to  reign. 

The  heathen  world  had  long  been  growing  old,  and  more 
and  more  turning  its  thoughts  backward  to  the  Golden  Age,  now 
gone  forever.  In  the  time  of  Decius  disaster  was  so  general, 
the  collapse  of  the  empire  under  inward  confusions  and  external 
assaults  appeared  so  imminent,  that  his  most  savage  persecution 
of  the  Christians,  in  the  interest  of  the  public  religion,  took 
therefrom  occasion  and  impulse.  Then,  for  the  first  time,  the 
sanctity  of  even  the  catacombs  was  violated,  and  Christians  wore 
buried  alive  in  them,  as  well  as  subjected,  outside  their  cham- 
bers, to  exquisite  tortures,  to  extort  their  apostasy.  But  even 
this  was  ineffectual,  as  were  the  continuous  persecutions  which 
followed,  under  Gallus  and  Yalerian ;  and  the  hope  of  the 
Christians  concerning  the  church,  with  the  world  which  contained 
it,  was  not  even  shaken.  As  Augustine  said  afterward,  looking 
back  to  this  time :  *  Christ  appeared  to  the  men  of  a  decrepit 
and  dying  world,  that  while  all  around  was  fading  they  might 
receive  through  Him  a  new  youthful  life.'  *  A  sense  of  the 
unconquerable  power  of  his  religion  had  been  in  Justin  Martyr. 
It  is  everywhere  in  Tertullian;  and  it  gave  to  Origen,  when 
writing  for  Christians  or  against  their  antagonists,  the  boldness, 
with  the  pi'ophetic  expectation,  of  the  most  eager  of  modern 
missionaries.  He  was  sure  of  the  end  :  when  every  ethnic  wor- 
ship should  vanish,  and  that  of  the  Christians  should  alone 
maintain  mastery. 

By  degrees  the  sense  of  this  forced  itself  even  upon  the 
persecutors  themselves,  whether  emperors  or  people ;  till  after  the 
last  frantic  effort  of  Diocletian,  under  the  savage  impulse  of  Ga- 
lerius,  to  destroy  churches,  scriptures,  and  Christians,  in  a  com- 
mon, annihilation — when  that  had  failed,  when  Diocletian  had 
left  the  throne,   and  when    Galerius,   consumed   by   a   disease 


*  Neander :  "  History  of  the  Church  "  ;  Vol.  I. :  p.  77, 


ON  THE   WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  305 

wliich  tuiTied  his  living  body  to  corruption,  had  issued  his  edicts 
A.D.  311,  ending  the  persecution,  and  soliciting  for  himself  and 
for  the  empire  the  prayers  of  those  Christians  whose  fellow-be- 
lievers he  had  maimed,  outraged,  and  burned  by  whole  congre- 
gations at  a  time — then  the  subsequent  conquest  of  the  empire 
to  Christianity  was  hardly  more  than  a  matter  of  months.  The 
"  Eeligious  Liberty  "  which  Tertullian  had  demanded,  was  fully 
conceded.  The  cross  was  at  last  blazoned  on  the  imperial  stand- 
ards. It  was  stamped  upon  coins,  and  painted  on  shields.  The 
final  fierce  struggle  against  the  religion  which  had  come  out  of 
Galilee  went  down  with  Maxentius  at  the  Milvian  Bridge.  The 
waters  of  the  Tiber  swept  over  its  relics ;  and  the  religion  of  the 
despised  ^N'azarene,  against  Uie  most  savage  and  persistent  resist- 
ance ever  known  in  the  world,  had  conquered  the  empire ! 

After  that  came  again  long  periods  of  darkness,  but  nothing 
extinguished  the  Christian's  hope.  When  Julian  sought,  in  his 
cultured  paganism,  to  dethrone  and  expel  the  new  religion,  you 
remember  the  almost  scornful  vN^ords  of  the  pres.'ient  xlthanasius, 
driven  from  Alexandria :  '  It  is  a  little  cloud,  and  it  will  pass.' 
It  was  after  the  Visigoths  had  overrun  Europe,  and  Rome  had 
been  stormed  and  sacked  by  their  terrible  hosts,  under  that  Alaric 
who  had  left  a  sweeping  desolation  behind  him,  that  Augustine 
wrote  his  "  City  of  God."  The  shock,  as  it  seemed,  of  a  tum- 
bling world,  which  terminated  the  old  era,  and  which  sent  noble 
families  into  beggared  exile,  only  exalted  before  his  vision  that 
enduring  and  triumphing  Kingdom  of  God  in  which  he  had  part. 
And  when  he  died,  in  the  midst  of  the  Yandal  siege  of  Hippo 
under  Genseric,  he  had  as  sure  an  expectation  of  the  ultimate 
victory  of  Christianity  on  the  earth  as  has  any  modern  disciple, 
who  sees  governments  confessing  the  religion  of  Jesus,  with  let- 
ters, arts,  industries,  policies,  suffused  by  its  influence,  and  the 
world  open  to  its  proclamation.  Even  the  rise  of  heresy  in  the 
church  could  not  disturb  this  imbedded  conviction  in  the  mind 
of  Augustine.  '  The  testimony  of  Jesus  '  was  to  him  certainly 
'  the  spirit  of  prophecy.' 

How  the  expectation  of  such  a  future,  for  the  new  religion,  and 
for  the  world  which  it  was  conceived  to  have  come  to  bless,  has 
since  wrought  in  the  church,  I  need  not  remind  you.  The  differ- 
20 


306  THE  EFFECT  OF  CffKISTIAmTY 

ence  of  Clu'istiaiiity,  as  a  religion  for  mankind,  from  tlie  old  re- 
ligions for  places  and  peoples,  being  clearly  apprehended — the 
fact  being  seen  that  it  appealed,  not  as  had  ancient  philosophies 
and  ethics  to  an  educated  class,  or  a  select  circle  of  high-born 
youth,  but  to  even  the  humblest  and  least  accomplished,  and 
that  through  its  unique  inspiration  of  faith  in  a  Lord  unseen  but 
still  sovereign  in  the  heavens,  it  had  a  power  which  former 
systems  inevitably  had  lacked,  for  the  noblest  exaltation  and  the 
true  regeneration  of  those  who  received  it — these  facts  being 
seen,  and  the  impression  being  received,  which  naturally  attended 
them,  that  God  was  in  this  new  religion,  and  would  work  for  it 
in  His  stupendous  and  governing  providence — the  expectation 
of  its  ultimate  triumph  became  only  natural.  It  rested  not  so 
much  on  particular  predictions,  though  these  seemed  abundant, 
as  on  the  general  energetic  and  victorious  Christian  conscious- 
ness. It  had  thus  a  certainty  as  of  intuitive  conviction ;  and  it 
made  men  as  sure  of  the  final  result  as  of  any  completed  processes 
in  nature. 

Here  has  been  the  foundation,  here  the  immense  and  constant 
inspiration,  of  that  missionary  enterprise  which  is  almost  pecu- 
liar to  Christianity ;  and  the  splendid  series  of  Christian  mis- 
sions, now  almost  forgotten,  but  in  themselves  benign  and  illus- 
trious, which  went  on  with  amazing  enthusiasm,  and  with 
prodigal  expenditure  of  labor  and  of  life,  throughout  the  Middle 
Age,  which  carried  over  Europe  the  religion  of  the  Christ,  and 
made  it  there  an  eternal  possession — ^it  was  based,  fundamentally, 
on  the  expectation  that  he  was  to  conquer,  and  that  service  ren- 
dered to  him  must  be  fruitful.  When  Ebbo  and  Anschar,  in  the 
ninth  century,  would  evangelize  the  Danes,  and  afterward  the 
Swedes — when  Friedrich  and  Thorwald,  a  century  and  a  half 
later,  carried  the  new  religion  to  Iceland — when  Adalbert  of 
Prague  ministered  to  the  savage  Hungarians,  or  when  at  a  later 
time  he  died,  under  pagan  violence,  while  seeking  to  carry  the 
Gospel  to  the  Prussians — when  Otto,  at  Stettin,  in  the  twelfth 
century,  assailed  by  a  furious  heathen  mob,  walked  forth  to 
meet  them,  in  the  midst  of  his  clergy,  calmly  chanting  psalms 
and  hymns — always  was  seen  the  motive  force  of  faith  in  the 
religion  which  they  honored  and  taught  as  apt  for  mankind. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  30t 

of  faith  in  the  Master  whom  they  believed  its  living  Defender^ 
of  faith  in  the  future  which  its  regenerating  power  was  to 
bring.* 

No  Christian  disciple  can  read,  I  am  sure,  without  a  tender 
and  strong  emotion,  of  the  vivid  and  seemingly  supernal  expe- 
rience of  the  youthful  French  Anschar,  in  the  ninth  century  : 
conscious  always  of  attraction  toward  God ;  hearing  voices,  which 
seemed  to  him  from  the  heavens,  in  the  ecstasy  of  his  dreams ; 
beholding  at  last,  as  in  a  vision,  an  immeasurable  light,  beneath 
which  were  standing  celestial  hosts,  and  out  of  which  came  a 
Yoice  which  said  to  him,  ''  Go,  and  return  to  me  crowned  with 
martyrdom" — a  Yoice  which  two  years  later  was  followed  by 
another,  distinctly  saying,  ''  Go  preach  the  word  to  the  tribes 
of  the  heathen!"  We  are  not  surprised  at  his  utter  conse- 
cration. We  are  not  surprised  that  when  the  fury  of  fanatical 
violence  raged  against  him  in  heathen  Sweden,  and  when  all  de- 
pended on  the  decision  of  one  assembly,  he  said  simply,  '  I  am 
sure  of  my  cause !     Grace  will  be  with  them  !' — as  it  was.f 

It  was  the  same  assured  expectation  which  animated  the 
monks,  the  real  civilizers  of  Europe,  in  their  hard  labors  and 
manifold  perils.  When  they  pierced  the  dense  and  malarious 
woods,  journeying  by  day,  and  lying  at  night  on  earth  and  stone, 
till  on  some  spot  less  sterile  than  the  rest  they  built  their  rude 
and  lonely  huts,  they  still,  like  Imier  in  the  Jura,  heard  in  the 
night  the  future  bells  of  that  monastery  ringing  which  was  tc 
replace  their  hasty  shelter.  The  howl  of  wolves  might  be  at 
first,  as  sometimes  it  was,  the  only  response  to  their  morning 
and  evening  song  and  prayer.  The  bandits  and  brigands,  who 
roamed  through  the  woods  in  reckless  ferocity,  might  hunt  them 
for  a  prey,  and  reckon  their  life  of  no  account.  The  hunting 
cavaliers,  waking  with  horns  the  many  echoes  of  grove  and 
glade,  might  look  with  utmost  scorn  upon  them.  The  King  him- 
self might  order  them,  as  Childebert  is  said  to  have  ordered 
ICarileff,  to  leave  the  woods,  and  allow  to  the  hunt  a  freei 


*  See  Neander:  "  Hist,  of  the  Church  "  :  Vol.  III. :  271,  et  seg.:  300 :  333; 
Vol.  4  :  42,  28. 

t  Neander  :  "  Hist,  of  the  Chureh  *';  Vol.  III. :  pp.  274,  285. 


308  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

course.*  But  the  monk  believed,  in  spite  of  all,  that  at  mst 
there  should  come  to  these  wild  and  rocky  forest  solitudes  the 
reign  of  a  Christian  civilization :  the  nature  of  v^hich  he  nc 
doubt  often  misunderstood,  but  the  reality  of  which  was  as  cei'- 
tain  to  him  as  were  planet  beneath  and  stars  overhead.  Mon- 
talembert  has  well  said  that  ^the  ensign  and  emblazonry  of 
the  entire  history  of  the  monks  daiing  those  early  ages,'  was 
''Cruce,  et  Aratro."  The  result  of  their  invincible  patience 
and  labor  is  recorded  in  the  fact  that  the  richest  districts  of 
France  are  to-day  those  wherein  the  ancient  monasteries  were 
planted,  and  that  the  wildness  of  savage  tribes,  more  formid- 
able than  of  nature  or  of  beasts,  became  in  the  end  subjected 
to  them. 

This  sure  expectation  of  ultimate  success,  because  their  re- 
ligion had  come,  they  thought,  from  God  himself,  to  lift  men 
to  Him,  because  to  them  its  law  was  imperative,  its  miracles 
were  inspiring,  its  discoveries  of  the  future  transcendently 
bright — this,  and  not  their  zeal  for  a  hierarchy,  was  the  earliest 
and  the  grandest  incentive  of  the  monks,  all  over  the  Continent : 
as  it  was,  as  well,  of  Dega  in  Ireland,  transcribing  with  his  own 
hand  three  hundred  copies  of  the  Gospels;  or  of  Finnian,  lead- 
ing toward  the  heavenly  country  innumerable  souls ;  as  it  was 
of  Oolumba,  landing  in  lona,  where  the  piety  of  Johnson,  twelve 
centuries  later,  grew  consciously  warmer,  preaching  to  the 
savage  and  unsubdued  Picts,  preaching  in  the  Orkney  Islands, 
most  tender  to  his  companions,  while  so  daring  upon  tempestu- 
ous seas  that  the  sailors  thought  him  the  meek  master  of  all  the 
winds  that  ever  blew ;  as  it  was  of  the  Benedictine  Augustine, 
carrying  the  new  religion  to  England  ;  or  of  the  Yenerable  Bede, 
dying  while  translating  the  Gospel  of  John  into  the  familiar 
Saxon  tongue,  and  with  his  last  difficult  breath  giving  gloiy  to 
God! 

Almost  everywhere  throughout  the  Middle  Age,  in  the  midst 
of  whatever  outward  calamities,  we  trace  this  expectant  Chiis- 
tain  pre-vision  of  the  brighter  and  grander  time  to  come.     The 


*  Montalembert :  "  Monks  of  the  West ":  London  ed.,  1861 :  Vol.  II. :  pp. 
B41-347. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  309 

only  point  at  which  it  failed,  signallj^  or  widely,  was  at  that 
most  disastrous  period,  the  close  of  the  tenth  century,  and  the 
opening  of  the  eleventh  ;  and  then  the  transient  discouragement 
was  due,  not  so  much  to  any  misconstruction  of  the  words  of  the 
Apocalypse,  as  to  the  frightful  corruption  enthroned  and  domi- 
nating at  the  centre  of  Christendom.  It  was  lust,  greed,  faction, 
malice,  murder,  incest,  in  the  swift  successive  or  the  desperate 
simultaneous  claimants  of  the  Papacy — it  was  luxury,  worldliness, 
insatiate  avarice,  and  a  haughtier  than  any  military  arrogance, 
in  the  principal  seats  of  churchly  authority — which  made  men 
fear  that  the  pestilence  and  the  famine  smiting  the  earth  were 
forerunners  of  Judgment;  that  even  the  religion  Divinely 
authenticated  for  the  blessing  of  man  must  fail  of  success,  and 
that  the  final  catastrophe  of  the  planet,  heralded  by  meteors, 
and  by  strange  showers  of  bloody  rain,  was  nigh  at  hand.  But 
when  that  terrible  epoch  passed,  and  when  Christianity  began 
again  to  assert,  in  places  at  least,  its  power  to  master  human 
passions,  the  up-spring  of  hope  was  like  the  sudden  break  of 
day  after  a  wild  and  dreary  night.  Again  men  looked  forward 
to  the  coming  of  a  future  of  beauty  and  of  peace. 

It  was  the  expectation  of  this,  to  be  wrought  out  of  course  by 
the  Church  which  they  ruled,  which  in  large  measure  gave  to 
Hildebrand  his  power,  and  to  Innocent  his,  over  soldiers  and 
kings.  The  whole  elaborated  and  complex  hierarchy  had  had 
from  the  first  an  intimate  relation  to  this  conviction  of  the  per- 
manence of  the  religion  which  it  was  designed  to  subserve  and 
maintain,  and  of  the  ever- widening  power  proper  to  that.  The 
vast  organization  had  been  rooted  rather  in  fancied  needs  than 
in  fantastic  ambitions.  It  attempted  to  give  an  earthly  instru- 
ment sufficiently  extensive  and  sufficiently  powerful  for  the  full 
expression,  and  the  cosmical  activity,  of  the  advancing  world- 
religion.  The  more  than  imperial  authority  of  the  Master  was 
to  find  in  it  a  more  adequate  exhibition  than  the  imperial  secu- 
lar  authority  ruling  from  Rome  had  found  in  the  careful  con- 
stitution of  the  empire ;  and  so,  for  centuries,  the  immense  and 
manifold  ecclesiastical  system  gave  illustration,  while  it  gave 
stimulation,  to  the  expectant  confidence  of  believers. 

This  particular  development  of  that  expectation,  in  the  line  oi 


310  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRISTIAJS'ITT. 

an  earthlj  organization  vast  enough,  splendid  enough,  to  corre- 
spond  with  the  grandeur  of  Christ's  spiritual  kingdom — to  have 
a  permanence  like  that  in  the  world,  and  to  bear  on  all  its  won- 
drous constitution  celestial  benedictions,  while  it  showed  in  its 
structure  celestial  inspirations — this  we  hold,  without  any  doubt? 
to  have  been  mistaken.  Its  subsequent  history  appears  to  us 
to  have  proved  it  human,  not  Divine  :  the  creature  of  man's 
misapprehension  as  to  what  the  religion  of  the  Master  required, 
for  its  surest  defence,  for  its  widest  propagation  ;  the  result  of 
a  confusion  of  secular  needs  with  those  on  the  higher  spiritual 
levels,  to  which  the  others  were  not  correspondent.  It  seems  to 
us  to  show  the  impulse,  and  incorporate  the  effects,  of  man's  not 
unnatural  misconception,  in  an  age  when  fixed  titular  rank 
and  positive  authority  had  still  much  of  their  ancient  preemi- 
nence, rather  than  to  be,  in  any  just  sense,  the  fruit  of  the 
counsel  and  incentive  of  the  Master.  But  we  must  not  over- 
look the  significant  fact  that  it  based  its  imperious  appeal  to 
men's  thoughts  on  their  assurance  of  the  proper  lordship  and 
the  predicted  supremacy  of  the  Christ  in  the  earth  ;  that  their 
admiration  was  attracted  to  the  effort  to  make  it  as  grand  in 
earthly  exhibition  as  his  kingdom  was  in  moral  preeminence  ; 
and  that  because  it  was  widely  believed — and  is  by  many  to- 
day believed — to  be  the  appropriate  palace  in  the  world  for  his 
indwelling,  it  had  such  majesty,  and  keeps  it  still,  before  the 
minds  of  its  adherents.  It  was  to  be — if  the  primitive  concep- 
tion had  been  correct,  it  ought  to  have  been — to  other  kingdoms, 
as  Hildebrand  wrote  of  it  to  William  the  Conqueror,  '  what  the 
sun  is  to  the  moon  in  the  heavenly  order.'  *  Because  men 
thought  it  Divinely  commensurate,  in  earthly  relations,  with 
the  proper  supremacy  of  him  who  was  the  immortal  and  reno- 
vating King  of  the  world,  they  expected  it  at  last  to  fill  the 
earth,  and  all  the  ages,  with  its  superb  and  shining  presence. 

By  the  same  great  interior  expectation,  the  vast  cathedrals, 
built  to  stand  for  many  centuries,  were  modulated  to  mighty 
rhythm ;  and  their  enormous  continuing  foundations  have  this 


*  Villemain  :  "  Life  of  Gregory  Seventh  ":  London  ed.,  1874  :  Vol.  IL 
p.  233. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  31] 

hope  of  the  future  wrought  into  every  enduring  course  of  cjclo- 
pean  masonry.  The  Crusades  implied  it,  if  they  did  not  spring 
from  it.  Their  moral  significance  is  in  their  vast  and  impassioned 
affirmation  that  Christendom  is  properly  sovereign  in  the  earth, 
and  that  the  places  trodden  by  its  Lord  should  be  possessed  by  hia 
religion.  It  lurks  as  a  refrain — this  sense  of  the  sovereignty  which 
belongs  to  Christianity,  and  of  its  final  victory  on  earth — under  the 
stubborn  discussions  of  the  schoolmen.  It  breaks  into  expression 
in  sweet  and  lofty  mediaeval  hymns,  whose  stanzas  chime  as  if 
written  for  harps,  or  throb  and  thunder  as  to  drum-beat  and 
organ.  Out  of  it,  in  fact,  sprang  the  Reformation  :  which  was 
seen  to  be  needful,  which  had  for  generations  been  seen  to  be 
needful,  by  those  who  in  spirit  preceded  the  Reformers,  in  order 
to  the  fruitful  work  of  Christianity  in  the  upbuilding  of  its  su- 
preme future.-  Their  spirit  was  always  that  of  John  Tauler, 
who  quotes  a  text  in  an  Advent  sermon  which  nobody  since  has 
been  able  to  find,  but  which  to  him  was  manifestly  precious : 
^'  God  leadeth  the  righteous  by  a  narrow  path  into  a  broad  high- 
way, till  they  come  to  a  wide  and  open  place."  * 

On  the  front  of  a  house  at  Frankfort  on  the  Maine,  from 
whose  antique  balcony,  facing  the  Cathedral,  Luther  is  reported 
to  have  preached,  I  remember  to  have  read  the  Latin  legend, 
said  to  have  been  suggested  by  him :  "  In  silentio  ac  spe  erit 
vestra  fortitudo."  Silence  does  not  seem,  to  one  studying  his 
career,  to  have  been  a  marked  attribute  of  the  great  German, 
whose  words,  at  once  tender  and  terrible,  wrought  such  changes 
in  Christendom  ;  but  hopefulness  for  the  future  surely  was,  as 
it  was,  if  not  equally,  with  his  gentler  associates.  Partly  be- 
cause he  had  it  not,  Erasmus  tarried  outside  the  combat  which 
he  had  done  so  much  to  compel. 

Since  that  great  era  of  Reformation  this  spirit  of  hope  never 
has  failed,  among  those  who  have  inherited  the  doctrine  and  re- 
peated the  impulse  of  its  great  leaders.  What  a  power  it 
showed  in  Puritan  England,  in  the  darkest  days  for  evangelical 

*  •'  History  of  John  Tauler '':  Miss  Winkworth's  translation.  New  York 
■ed.,  1S58  :  p.  213.  [The  German  quotation  is  :  "  Gott  fuehret  die  Gerech- 
ten  durch  einen  engen  Weg  in  die  breite  Strasze,  dasz  sic  kommen  in  did 
Weite  und  iu  die  Breite."] 


312  THE  EFFECT  OF  CHRmTIANlTY 

teaching  and  for  liberty  of  worship,  we  perfectly  know ;  what 
power  among  the  Huguenots  of  France,  wlien  hunted  to  their 
^fastnesses  in  the  Cevennes,  or  when  done  to  death  in  fire  oj 
flood,  or  the  fierce  dragonnades ;  what  power  among  the  perse- 
cuted Christians  of  the  valleys  of  the  Yaudois,  or  of  the  Aus- 
trian Tyrol.  It  has  been  the  inheritance  of  the  church  on  this 
continent,  from  the  beginning.  The  Pilgrims  had  drawn  the 
robust  conviction  into  their  life,  from  all  their  study  of  both  tlie 
Testaments,  that  kingdom  might  perish  after  kingdom,  dynasties 
pasSj  the  most  solid  institutions  of  the  earth  be  subverted,  but 
that  the  religion  of  him  of  Nazareth  never  should  fail ;  and 
that  to  plant  this  in  the  untracked  woods  of  this  wilderness-con- 
tinent was  to  give  it  the  only  certain  promise  of  an  enduring 
civilization.  So  hither  they  came,  and  here  they  stood,  un- 
daunted by  nature  in  her  unaccustomed  and  terrifying  aspects, 
undaunted  by  savages,  undaunted  by  even  the  evil  personalities 
which  seemed  to  them  to  be  darkening  the  air.  They  had,  at 
any  rate,  the  courage  of  their  convictions.  They  expected  small 
colonies  to  become  the  foundation  of  great  commonwealths ; 
that  the  seed  of  their  humble  sacrificed  life  would  spring  at  last 
into  bounteous  harvests,  vital  and  golden ;  and  their  fortitude 
was  inspired,  and  continually  maintained,  by  this  immense  un- 
subduable  hope. 

The  Dutch  had  been  in  like  manner  animated  in  their  heroic 
and  unsurpassed  struggle  against  military  tyranny  and  religious 
persecution ;  and  on  that  marshy  and  yielding  soil  which  they 
themselves  had  plucked  from  the  sea,  they  had  faced  without 
flinching  the  utmost  fury  of  Spanish  power,  because  they  ex- 
pected success  in  the  end  for  what  was  conformed  to  Christ's  re- 
ligion. Except  for  the  resistant  and  incalculable  force  thus  in- 
spired they  must  have  yielded  to  the  proud,  wealthy,  infuriated 
empire,  which  for  eighty  years,  with  only  the  interval  of  a 
twelve  years'  truce,  raged  around  them  like  a  furious  sea  beat- 
ing upon  their  recent  dykes.  They,  if  any  people  on  earth, 
were  '  saved  by  hope.' 

Our  fathers,  therefore,  Dutch,  English,  Huguenot,  brought 
hither  this  profound  expectation  of  a  future  for  the  world,  bright 
and  great,  ample  and  holy,  to  be  secured  by  their  religion.     It 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  313 

was  ill  them  amid  the  Indian  wars,  which  scarred  with  fire 
where  they  did  not  consume  the  nascent  settlements,  and  it  was 
an  unfailing  tonic  to  their  souls.  It  w^as  in  them  amid  the  Rev- 
olutionarj  struggle.  It  was  in  their  councils  when  the  great 
institutions  of  government  in  this  country  were  shaped  and  set, 
after  the  Peace  of  a.d.  1783.  The  later  missionary  development 
sprang  from  it,  as  it  had  done  before,  centuries  earlier,  in  south- 
ern and  in  central  Europe.  All  subsequent  philanthropical 
effort  and  plan  have  had  in  this  their  inspiration.  It  has  lain  at 
the  base  of  colleges,  seminaries,  and  the  multiplied  schools  for 
popular  instruction,  as  well  as  of  special  church-activities.  How 
poweiful  a  force  it  was,  you  remember,  in  our  late  Civil  War. 
Men  could  not  be  persuaded — no  matter  what  the  present  deci- 
sion of  arms  might  appear  on  the  bloodiest  fields,  no  matter 
what  peril  might  at  any  time  threaten,  of  division  in  the  loyal 
states,  or  of  foreign  intervention — they  could  not  be  persuaded 
that  a  righteous  Liberty  was  not  at  last  to  conquer  in  the  strife  ; 
because  this  seemed  as  essential  as  the  planet  to  the  future  of 
the  race,  and  that  future,  as  one  of  consummate  clearness  and 
peace,  and  of  majestic  moral  order,  was  to  them  as  certain  as 
was  the  historical  advent  of  Jesus.  I  do  not  believe,  for  one, 
that  a  forty  years'  war  would  have  conquered  this  hope,  so  im- 
bedded is  it  in  the  national  mind.  If  it  had  ever  failed,  the  loss 
would  have  been  more  than  the  loss  of  all  armies,  since  the  con- 
tinent would  then  have  been  ready  to  accept  almost  any  fate  of 
anarchy  or  misrule. 

N^or  is  this  assured  expectation  of  the  future  peculiar  to  us  : 
the  result,  perhaps,  of  our  national  youth,  of  our  great  spaces  of 
virgin  soil,  of  our  brilliant  and  exhilarating  atmosphere.  It  is 
in  Europe,  in  Christian  communities,  as  it  is  among  us.  There, 
as  here,  the  religion  which  is  so  apt  for  mankind,  and  which  has 
so  signally  blessed  the  world,  has  spread  this  immense  impres- 
sion around  it,  even  upon  those  who  for  themselves  scarcely  ac- 
cept its  discoveries  or  its  rules.  Among  those  who  do  accept 
these,  the  religion  is  recognized  as  in  its  nature  of  secular  and 
unwasting  force.  It  is  seen  to  be  powerfully  advancing  in  the 
world,  at  the  present  hour ;  to  be  widening  in  its  range,  and  ex- 
vteuding  to  remoter  regions;  to  be  putting  fresh  energies,  aU 


314  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRmTIANITY 

the  time,  into  moral,  political,  social  life.  Assaults  upon  it  are 
made,  of  course,  as  they  were  aforetime.  They  only  show  ita 
enduring  vitality;  are  the  sceptical  response  to  its  inflexible 
claim  of  authority.  They  offer  the  most  significant  tribute  to 
its  unchanging  and  imperative  power  ;  and  they  no  more  harm  it, 
in  the  end,  than  errors  in  geometry  confuse  the  spheres.  It  en- 
ters literature,  in  our  own  time,  more  finely  and  fully  than  ever 
before.  It  is  in  novels,  poems,  histories,  in  delightful  essays, 
profound  treatises,  charming  biographies,  even  more,  one  might 
not  unfrequently  say,  than  it  is  in  sermons.  It  affects  legisla- 
tions, in  their  spirit  and  intent,  with  an  ever-expanding  reach  of 
influence.  It  erects  continually  new  institutions,  of  its  charity, 
for  its  beneficence.  It,  and  it  only,  involves  the  elements  and. 
presents  the  assurance  of  that  moral  culture,  common  to  peoples, 
and  general  in  the  world,  on  which  civilizations  may  securely 
repose,  and  in  expressing  and  serving  which  they  become  of  en- 
during ethical  worth.  Philosophies  are  futile,  and  raoi'alities 
are  inadequate,  to  an  end  at  once  so  vital  and  so  vast.  The  re- 
ligion of  the  New  Testament,  in  its  prodigious  and  still  nnmeat^ 
ured  spiritual  force,  has  done  the  work,  partially  at  least,  amid 
disastrous  and  disheartening  times,  in  the  previous  centuries. 
It  is  now  as  apt  and  equal  to  it  as  ever  it  was  ;  and  with  the  old 
coniidence,  of  the  time  of  Origen,  or  of  that  of  Augustine,  it 
expects  still  the  coming  ages. 

No  matter  what  men's  fears  may  suggest,  to  such  as  would 
have  shrunk  from  the  gopher-wood  Ark  as  not  strong  enough  for 
the  waters,  to  such  as  are  fearful  on  any  warm  day  of  an  impend- 
ing conflagration  of  the  planet,  Christianity  to-day,  to  a  greater 
extent  than  ever  before,  is  the  moulding  force  in  civilization ;. 
and  it  is  the  one  force,  infrangible  as  sunshine,  while  silent  aa^ 
that,  and  far  more  glorious  in  function  and  effect,  which  fears  no- 
assault,  knows  no  decay,  and  suffers  no  waste,  as  years  go  on. 
So  it  appears,  at  least,  to  those  who  have  traced  it  in  the  past,  and 
who  have  felt  on  themselves  its  vast  impression  ;  and  while  that 
impression  continues  on  their  spirits,  their  glad  and  great  expec- 
tation of  the  future  can  only  grow  brighter  as  that  future  comes 
nearer.  It  has  passed,  in  fact,  into  the  thought  and  life  of  the 
world ;  and  all  recent  enterprise  among  the  nations  of  Chris.. 


ON  THE  WORLD'S  HOPE  OF  PROGRESS.  31  £ 

tendom,  for  physical  advance,  for  legal  reform,  for  just  amend 
ment  of  political  conditions,  takes  impulse  and  courage  from  this 
hope  of  the  future.  The  age  is  one,  some  one  has  said,  '  im- 
patient of  Isthmuses.'  It  is  equally  impatient  of  mountain-bar- 
riers, or  of  the  obstacles  to  human  intercourse  interposed  by 
winds  and  waves  on  the  sea,  by  streams  or  desert-tracts  on  the 
land.  And  behind  every  drill  which  cuts  the  rock  in  the  moun- 
tain tunnel,  behind  every  engine  which  drives  the  ship  against 
storm  and  tempest  over  the  riotous  fury  of  waves,  or  which  pro- 
pels the  loaded  train  over  alkali  plains  and  rocky  crests,  is  this 
invisible  force  of  the  spirit  which  since  the  new  religion  came 
has  expected  a  future  to  be  wrought  out  by  it,  conformable  to  it, 
its  ultimate  crown  of  earthly  glory. 

Whatever  else  fails,  while  that  remains,  the  race  will  still  be 
rich  and  strong.  Whatever  else  comes,  if  that  has  vanished, 
mankind  will  be  without  foresight  or  nerve  in  the  loss  of  this 
unmeasured  incentive.  Christianity  alone  can  supply  it,«  All 
other  religions  have  entered  their  period,  or  have  fulfilled  it,  of 
retrogression.  Christianity  alone  develops  still  its  pristine  force, 
advances  still  on  the  path  of  its  conquests.  Scepticism  is  uni- 
formly pessimistic.  Faith,  alone,  soars  and  exults.  To  the  inan 
who  is  doubtful  about  this  religion — who  looks  upon  it  with 
either  critical  incredulity,  or  the  frigid  complacence  of  an  out- 
side amateur — the  world  almost  always  grows  daily  darker.  Ta 
the  missionary  laborer  in  far  lands,  mastering  with  difficulty  un 
known  tongues,  suiTounded  by  unfamiliar  arts  and  dusky  faces, 
toiling  for  years  to  make  a  few  souls  know  something  of  him 
who  taught  in  Palestine,  the  future  is  as  certain  as  if  he  touched 
it ;  and  that  future,  to  his  exulting  expectation,  is  to  be  as  radi- 
ant with  glory  as  the  sky  over  Calvary  was  heavy  with  gloom — 
as  resplendent  with  lovely  celestial  lights  as  to  his  imagination, 
if  you  hold  that  the  faculty  chiefly  concerned,  was  the  mount  of 
the  Lord's  supreme  ascension.  He  expects  long  toil,  and  many 
disasters,  incarnadined  seas,  dreary  wildernesses,  battles  with 
giants,  and  spasms  of  fear  in  the  heart  of  the  church.  But  ha 
looks  as  surely  as  he  looks  for  the  sunrise,  after  nights  of  tempest 
and  of  lingering  dawn,  for  the  ultimate  illumination  of  the 
world  by  the  Faith.     And  however  full  of  din  and  dissonanca 


316  THE  EFFECT  OF  GHRISTIAmTY. 

the  history  of  mankind  has  seemed  hitherto,  seems  even  to-day,  he 
anticipates  already  the  harmonies  to  be  in  it  as  under  the  guid- 
ance of  him  of  Galilee  it  draws  toward  its  predestined  close, 
*  not  sentimental  or  idyllic,  but  epic  and  heroic' 

In  a  familiar  and  famous  passage  in  YirgiPs  fourth  eclogue, 
written  perhaps  forty  years  before  Christ,  he  hails  with  song  the 
birth  of  a  child  who  is  to  restore  the  Golden  Asre.  His  figures 
seem  caught  from  the  prophecies  of  Isaiah — perhaps  through  the 
books  of  the  so-called  Erythraean  Sibyl,  then  read  in  Kome — as 
he  sketches  the  time  when  the  goat  shall  bring  home  the  milk- 
swelled  udders,  and  the  herds  shall  have  no  fear  of  great  lions ; 
when  the  serpent  shall  be  extinct,  with  the  poisonous  herb ; 
when  the  ruddy  grape  shall  natively  hang  on  vines  uncultured, 
and  the  stiff  oaks  shall  distil  liquid  honey  ;  when  every  region 
shall  be  fruitful  in  all  things,  and  the  ground  shall  no  more  be 
subjected  to  the  harrow,  nor  the  vine  to  the  knife. 

The  boy  of  whom  Virgil  is  supposed  to  have  written  was  im- 
prisoned by  Tiberius,  and  starved  to  death  in  his  solitary  dun- 
geon. The  child  of  whom  Isaiah  wrote  now  leads  in  triumph, 
toward  unreached  ages,  the  aspiring  and  hopeful  civilization  of 
the  world.  In  his  Name,  is  the  hope  of  mankind.  In  the  sign 
of  his  Cross,  Christendom  conquers. 


LECTURE    X 


A  KEVIETV  OF  THE  ARGTOIENT,  WITH  ADDED 
SUGGESTIONa 


LECTURE  X. 

In  reaching  the  last  of  this  series  of  Lectures — the  delivery  oi 
^vhich  has  been  always  a  pleasure,  through  your  unabating  and 
kind  attention — 1  trust  that  I  may  assume  the  admission  by  you 
that  the  design  with  which  I  commenced  has  been  at  least  in  some 
measure  accomplished :  not  as  it  might  have  been,  if  I  had  had 
-the  larger  leisure  and  ampler  knowledge  which  others  possess, 
but  as  far  as  one  working  within  my  limitations  could  perhaps 
hope  to  fulfil  it.  I  did  not  propose  at  all,  you  remember,  to 
prove  with  apodeictic  certainty  the  Divine  authorship  of  Chris- 
tianity,— the  very  nature  of  the  moral  and  affectionate  faith  for 
which  this  appeals  making  such  an  attempt  plainly  absurd.  But 
I  hoped  to  show  that  such  an  origin  of  this  religion  is  impres- 
sively indicated,  by  certain  evident  historical  effects  attending 
it  in  the  world  ;  and  to  this  I  have  limited  our  attention.  I  have 
certainly  had  no  end  to  accomplish,  except  to  ascertain  and  set 
forth  the  truth,  which  it  is  as  important  for  me  as  for  any  one  to 
discover  and  accept. 

I  do  not,  of  course,  profess  to  stand  toward  the  religion  which 
we  have  inherited  as  an  intelligent  pagan  might  have  stood  in  the 
day  of  Tiberius.  Beyond  dispute,  it  seems  to  me,  the  crowded 
.and  sio:niiicant  intervenino:  centuries  ouojht  to  count  for  some- 
thing,  in  your  estimate,  and  in  mine,  of  the  novel  force  then  en- 
tering society.  I  have  had  no  wish  either,  and  I  make  no  pre- 
tence, to  take  the  place  of  an  incredulous,  or  a  merely  careless 
and  indifferent  critic,  when  standing  in  front  of  our  religion. 
The  recognition  of  its  transforming  power  involves  neither  weak- 
ness nor  shame,  nor  does  it  discredit  any  man's  judgment.  But 
neither,  on  the  other  hand,  have  I  had  the  least  wish  to  over-esti- 
>mate,  in  thought  or  in  word,  what  it  has  actually  done  among 

^319) 


320  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

men.  I  have  simply  sought  frankly  to  place  you  at  the  point  of 
view  from  which  I  regard  the  matter  considered;  to  offer  to- 
jour  minds  a  course  of  thought  famihar  to  my  own,  and  influen- 
tial years  ago  on  my  convictions ;  and  to  lead  you  to  conclusions, 
if  these  at  last  shall  seem  to  you  fair,  in  which  I  rejoice.  If 
I  have  been  anywhere  seriously  mistaken,  I  am  glad  to  be  sure 
that  your  further  studies  will  correct  me.  If  what  I  have  said 
shall  appear  to  yon,  now  and  hereafter,  justified  by  the  facts,  1 
delightedly  hope  that  you  will  thank  God  more  than  ever  for 
the  Faith  which  He  sent  into  the  world,  and  will  serve  and 
honor  the  Master  whom  it  manifests  to  our  minds,  with  a  fresh 
consecration. 

You  will  bear  me  witness,  I  am  confident,  that,  whatever  my 
personal  convictions  may  be,  I  have  assumed  nothing  concerning 
this  religion  which  does  not  lie  plainly  upon  its  surface,  to  be  no- 
ticed at  once  by  every  observer.  Without  discussing  or  describ- 
ing its  particular  contents,  as  I  rejoice  to  apprehend  and  accept 
these — without  trying  by  analysis  to  exhibit  systematically  its- 
general  vast  and  affirmative  scheme,  and  to  set  forth  its  parts  in 
what  to  me  appears  beyond  doubt  their  just  coordination — I  have 
taken  it  simply  as  a  distinguished  historical  system,  which  ap- 
peared in  the  world  at  a  definite  date,  recognized  by  all,  and 
which  is  fairly  reported  to  us  in  certain  writings  familiarly  known 
as  the  New  Testament ;  and  I  have  sought  to  outline  before  you 
the  distinct  relations  of  that  religion  which  these  writings  con- 
fessedly represent,  to  the  progress  and  culture  of  the  subsequent 
times :  not  desiring  to  attribute  anything  to  it  which  does  not 
belong  to  it;  not  seeking  to  refer  to  it  directly  what  may  have 
come  from  secondary  forces,  often  as  I  think  inspired  by  itself, 
yet  working  with  it  in  parallel  lines  ;  and  certainly  not  trying  to 
conceal,  from  your  eyes  or  from  my  own,  the  failure  of  its  energy 
to  wholly  renew  the  nature  of  man,  or  to  do  all  the  work  in 
amending  his  customs  which  from  a  celestial  religion,  if  unre- 
sisted by  human  folly  or  human  passion,  might  properly  be  ex- 
pected. It  is  no  picture  of  fancy  which  I  have  tried  to  exhibit : 
no  picture  of  prophesied  Milleimial  beauty,  as  if  already  that  had 
been  realized  on  this  confused  and  turbulent  planet.  But  taking- 
the  state  of  human  society  as  it  palpably  was  before  tliis  religion^ 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  321 

was  declared  in  the  world,  and  comparing  it  with  that  which  has 
since  appeared,  I  have  exhibited  to  you  my  conviction  that  certain 
peculiar  and  transcendent  elements  have  entered  the  governing 
life  of  mankind  through  this  religion  ;  and  that  its  effect  thus  far 
has  been  to  elevate  and  purify,  to  up-lift  and  set  forward,  in  a 
wholly  unique  mode  and  measure,  the  race  to  which  an  impulse 
vas  brought  by  it  immense  and  commanding. 

In  pursuing  this  general  line  of  thought,  I  have  shown,  as  I 
think,  that  a  new  and  nobler  conception  of  God  was  certainly 
thus  made  familiar  to  the  world :  one  naturally  surpassing  any- 
thing which  had  been  reached  on  the  same  majestic  and  inspiring 
theme,  either  in  the  popular  religions  of  antiquity,  or  in  the 
highest  philosophy  of  that  time :  one  in  which  the  sublime  ele- 
ments of  that  discovery  of  God  to  the  Hebrews  which  preceded 
Christianity  were  accepted,  combined,  and  magnificently  sur 
passed,  by  a  fresh  and  surely  a  supreme  exhibition  of  Love  as 
the  inmost  life  of  God's  being,  of  holiness  as  its  perfect  mani- 
festation, and  of  the  Divinest  self-sacrifice  as  its  fruit.  The 
effect  of  this  Christian  doctrine  of  God  on  the  mental  and  moral 
life  of  mankind,  and  on  the  civilization  which  gives  to  that  life 
its  constant  exhibition,  can  hardly,  it  would  seem,  be  overstated. 

I  have  shown  also,  or  sought  to  show,  that  a  change  in  large 
measure  corresponding  with  this  has  been  wrought  in  the  con- 
ception which  man  now  has,  so  far  as  this  religion  has  reached 
him,  of  the  dignity  and  worth  of  his  own  nature :  that  since 
Christianity  made  its  appeal,  which  all  must  admit  to  be  vast 
and  majestic,  and  which  it  affirms  to  be  Divine,  to  every  person  to 
whom  its  teachings  and  documents  come,  as  the  ancient  religions 
or  speculative  moralities  had  not  done — since  it  showed  God, 
taking  its  statement  of  things  as  true,  as  interested  in  man,  and 
declared  Immortality  waiting  for  him,  with  such  a  solemn  and 
<iovoreign  emphasis  as  was  wholly  unparalleled  in  any  poetry  or 
any  religion  before  it  was  preached — the  soul  of  man,  for  its 
OWL  sake,  amid  whatever  accidents  of  condition,  has  been  rec- 
cgniised  as  worthy  of  nobler  care  and  higher  honor ;  and  what- 
ever involves  this  idea,  and  is  animated  by  it,  has  had  a  promi- 
nence and  a  permanence  in  the  Chiistian  society  such  as  before 
were  nniniagined. 
21 


322  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

I  have  shown  also,  or  sought  to  show,  the  new  conception 
which  plainly  and  certainly  came  to  the  world  with  the  teaching 
of  Jesus  concerning  the  duty  which  man  owes  to  God  in  the 
sphere  of  Worship:  how  the  old  forms  of  external  sacrifice 
passed  away  on  the  instant,  wherever  this  religion  appeared  ; 
how  for  such  was  substituted  the  more  intimate  and  inesti- 
mable saciifice  of  self,  in  the  conquest  of  whatever  within  the 
soul  is  alien  to  God,  and  in  consecration  to  His  Divine  service ; 
what  a  power  of  love  was  then  shown  in  worship,  unknown 
in  the  world  until  that  hour,  and  what  joy  was  expressed  in  it, 
with  a  new-born  and  reverent  faith  —  articulate  in  music,  in 
mighty  and  exulting  hymns,  in  great  liturgies  and  creeds,  after 
A  time  in  the  very  structure  of  the  houses  for  praise ;  and  how  this 
fipirit  is  contemplated  by  Christianity  as  working  abroad  into  the 
entire  contexture  of  life,  and  as  properly  impenetrating  and  de- 
voting to  the  Most  High  all  active  powers,  in  all  their  exercise,  in 
the  manifold  labor  and  endurance  of  man. 

The  new  conception  of  man's  duty  to  Man,  introduced  by  this 
religion,  I  tried  equally  to  illustrate :  showing  the  energy  and 
the  beautiful  fruit  of  it,  especially  in  the  cases  where  its  moral 
force  most  distinctly  collides  with  previous  established  custom 
or  law,  in  giving  protection  and  aid  to  the  weak  :  as  in  the  in- 
stance of  little  children ;  of  woman,  systematically  reduced  in 
antiquity  to  unjust  subordination ;  of  the  enslaved,  with  those 
incapacitated  for  the  struggle  of  life  by  sickness,  destitution,  or  by 
native  infirmity  of  body  or  of  mind.  As  the  sun  in  the  heavens 
turns  winter  ice  to  rippling  streams,  so  the  gospel  of  Galilee  has 
certainly,  to  a  great  extent,  throughout  the  domains  which  it  af- 
fects, turned  wealth  and  power  into  the  channels  of  cordial  be- 
neficence. It  carries  to-day  into  millions  of  cabins  securer  lib- 
erty, more  abundant  prosperity,  a  new  aspiration,  a  more  ani- 
mating hope ;  and  while  its  results  are  yet  confessedly  incom- 
plete, awaiting  a  consummation  still  to  be  realized,  in  each  of 
those  already  attained  lies  the  prediction  of  other  changes,  follow- 
ing the  same  clear  line  of  direction,  which  shall  make  the  future 
civilizations  of  the  world  more  lovely  and  benign  than  others, 
or  ours,  thus  far  have  been. 

Even  the  relation  of  States  to  each  other  has  also  been  changed, 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  323 

and  vitally  improved,  in  a  measure  almost  equal.  That  relation, 
as  one  of  mutual  alliances  and  reciprocating  charities,  was  first 
made  possible  by  the  passing  away  of  the  separating  force  of 
pagan  religions,  and  by  the  breaking  up  of  the  Roman  empire, 
which  had  come  to  be  pervaded  more  or  less  by  a  common 
Christianity,  as  well  as  by  a  common  jurisprudence.  Since  its 
distinct  emergence  into  history  the  movement  so  initiated  has 
gone  majestically  forward,  with  ever-enlarging  power  and  scope, 
under  the  impulse  of  the  prevalent  Faith.  Since  the  feudal 
system  fell,  which  localized  law,  and  which  organized  society 
around  minor  centres  into  many  distinct  defiant  districts — since 
nations,  breaking  out  of  those  paralyzing  restrictions,  became 
compact  and  permanent,  with  almost  a  personal  consciousness  in 
them — and  since  the  imperious  Papal  autocracy  ceased  to  attempt 
to  regulate  states  in  their  conduct  toward  each  other — the  sense 
of  obligation  to  the  unseen  equities  honored  by  Christ,  and  of 
common  obligations  to  God  and  to  each  other,  has  been  growing 
among  nations  in  clearness  and  force:  till  now  treaties  are 
sacred,  within  the  limitations  determined  by  themselves;  am- 
bassadors are  respected ;  injustice  is  rebuked,  between  peoples 
as  between  persons ;  combinations  occur  to  resist  the  ambitious, 
and  M  shelter  the  weak  ;  and  the  usages  of  war  are  constantly  miti- 
gated, if  war  itself  is  not  yet  abolished.  The  tendency  here  is 
to  the  final  establishment  of  courts  of  Arbitration,  taking  the 
place  of  decisions  by  Battle ;  and  the  ultimate  endunng  peace 
of  the  world — though  a  vision  still,  not  yet  a  fact — is  a  vision 
neither  so  remote  nor  so  vague  as  it  uniformly  seemed  in  the 
preceding  times. 

That  something  of  this,  that  much  of  it  indeed,  has  come,  in- 
Btrum  en  tally,  through  the  widening  of  commerce,  the  multipli- 
cation of  useful  arts,  an  advancing  social  and  political  wisdom,  I 
have  not  sought  to  conceal  from  your  view.  It  is  as  evident  to 
me  as  to  any  one.  But  that  the  power  of  the  Christian  religion 
has  been  behind  it,  and  behind  these  instruments  conspiring  to 
assist  it,  seems  no  less  apparent;  and  if  that  now  were  with- 
drawn from  the  world,  with  its  teaching  and  law,  and  its  spirit- 
ual impression — if  peoples  and  governments  were  left  to  no 
•other  guidance  and  control  in  their  moral  relations  than  those 


324  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  AR&VMENT, 

which  preceded  the  advent  of  Christ — I  see  no  guaranty  that 
the  old  chaos  of  jealous  and  contending  nations  might  not  return, 
in  fiercer  fight,  witli  bloodier  weapons,  a  more  terrible  tyranny 
of  the  stronger  powei-s  over  the  weak. 

In  developing  the  efiect  of  the  new  religion  on  the  menla) 
culture  and  training  of  mankind,  I  showed  how  inseparable  is 
such  an  effect  from  its  very  constitution,  as  the  chief  literary  re- 
ligion of  the  world :  coming  to  us  through  a  large  Book,  having 
many  authors,  who  wrote  with  a  singular  vividness  of  concep- 
tion  and  exuberance  of  impulse,  and  who  give  us  many  particu- 
lar books,  of  history,  biography,  legislation,  prophecy,  with 
maxims  of  profound  ethical  wisdom,  with  great  arguments  of 
doctrine,  with  spiritual  rules  for  the  shaping  of  character,  and 
with  gnomic  sayings  which  put  into  the  narrowest  compass  vast 
riches  of  thought :  how  such  a  religion,  of  necessity,  sets  the  mind 
on  which  its  powerful  impact  falls  into  instant,  various,  and  wide- 
ranging  action,  to  find  in  other  departments  of  knowledge  its 
illustrations  and  proofs,  or,  if  that  must  be,  to  find  arguments 
against  it ;  how  it  builds  up  always  a  rich  and  fruitful  middle- 
class  mind  ;  and  how  at  the  same  time  it  ministers  wdth  intrinsic 
vigor  to  higher  minds,  sending  them  forth  on  all  quests  for 
tnith,  giving  the  incentive,  and  creating  the  instruments,  for 
every  species  of  intelligent  research.  Its  literatures  multiply, 
its  scbools  expand  and  grow  to  universities,  by  a  law  of  its  na- 
ture. It  exalts  the  mental  spirit  in  man,  instead  of  depressing 
it,  by  the  tender,  majestic,  harmonious  discovery  of  things  super- 
natural, which  is  one  of  its  vital  characteristics.  It  opens  remot- 
est realms  of  speculation  by  its  circumspect  silences,  before  each 
inquisitive  spirit.  And  the  contrast  of  its  continual  efi^ect,  in  this 
direction,  with  those  of  the  various  ethnic  religions,  boasting  also 
their  sacred  books,  but  assisting  no  wide  intellectual  progress,  and 
giving  birth  to  no  benign  literatures,  is  like  the  contrast,  ever 
repeated,  of  the  day  with  the  night,  or  of  life  with  death. 

"When  we  turn  to  consider  the  moral  effects  accomplished  by 
this  religion,  not  on  individuals  only,  or  in  limited  communities, 
but  on  the  scale  of  national  hfe,  and  in  countries  and  capitals 
most  advanced  in  arts,  industries,  and  accumulated  resources,  the 
influence  of  it  appears  if  possible  yet  more  remarkable,  as  well 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  325 

as  more  salutary.  It  came  to  communities  »'ultured  in  letters, 
instructed  in  arts,  mighty  in  arms,  but  to  a  great  extent  morally 
rotten  with  luxury  and  lust,  the  prey  of  degraded  and  savage 
passions,  the  story  of  whose  life,  and  the  picture  of  whose  man- 
ners, are  ahnost  too  fearful  to  be  contemplated :  accustomed  to 
spectacles,  and  to  sensual  excesses,  which  now  would  make  any 
country  so  infamous  that  the  world  would  expect  the  globe  itself 
to  open  beneath  it  and  swallow  it  up.  Christianity,  in  its  wor- 
ship, its  humanity,  its  charity,  in  the  inflexible  fidelity  to  truth 
which  it  demanded,  and  in  the  heroical  energy  of  faith  toward 
a  Master  unseen  which  it  inspired,  struck  down  npon  this  an- 
cient life,  in  the  most  cruel  and  dissolute  capitals,  as  a  veritable 
gleam  from  worlds  celestial ;  and  though  it  encountered  tre- 
mendous resistance,  of  law,  argument,  fierce  invective,  stinging 
satire,  of  the  society  which  it  rebuked,  of  the  government  which 
it  challenged,  of  military  opposition,  and  of  popular  persecu- 
tions unparalleled  in  the  frenzied  fury  of  their  onset, — it  over- 
came that  resistance,  awakened  an  enthusiasm  which  spurned 
and  curbed  the  assailing  hostility,  converted  some  of  its  noblest 
champions  by  their  recoil  toward  its  amazing  serenity  amid 
storms,  and  finally  became  master  of  the  empire,  by  its  moral 
force,  aided  by  whatever  of  Divine  providence  we  may  recog- 
nize in  its  history. 

If  it  did  not  accomplish  all  that  might  seem  desirable  to  us,  it 
made  at  any  rate  the  former  conditions  of  personal  and  of  public 
life  impossible  to  be  repeated.  It  was  something  to  put  Con- 
stantine  in  the  place  of  Galerius,  and  to  set  a  man  like  Leo  the 
Great  on  the  throne  defiled  in  irapenal  days  with  hideous  and 
indescribable  crime.  It  was  something,  afterward,  to  take  the 
savage  nomadic  populations  which  rushed  in  upon  the  empire, 
and  to  build  up  from  them  Christian  states,  in  which  vice  exists 
but  without  repute ;  in  which  no  man  in  eminent  station  could 
repeat  with  impunity  any  one  of  thousands  of  uncriticized  ex- 
cesses of  Roman  Senators ;  in  which  the  strongest  throne  would 
fall  if  the  Sovereign  upon  it  were  now  to  repeat  a  single  one  of 
many  crimes  of  the  ancient  emperors.  Until  Christianity  has 
wholly  impressed  with  its  transforming  power  the  nature  of 
man,  it  cannot  banish  iniquity  from  the  earth.     But  it  has,  at 


326  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

any  rate,  branded  vice,  in  whatever  station,  with  indelible  mark 
It  has  forced  upon  vast  communities  of  men  the  sense  of  the 
necessity  of  righteousness  in  the  spirit,  as  the  source  and  the 
safeguard  of  righteousness  in  conduct.  And  its  prodigious  force 
has  been  shown,  in  instances  uncounted,  in  the  new  purity  to 
which  it  has  lifted  those  most  depraved,  who  seemed  abandoned 
of  God  and  man.  Once  let  it  come  to  its  perfect  contemplated 
supremacy  in  the  world,  and  a  society  as  pure  as  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount,  as  radiant  as  the  whiteness  of  the  transfigured  robe, 
as  supreme  against  evil  as  was  the  Lord  in  whom  the  religion  was 
then  incarnated,  must  be  its  immortal  and  illustrious  trophy. 

Finally,  this  religion  has  given  to  the  race  a  hope  for  the  fu- 
ture, in  the  coming  ages  of  earthly  history,  which  was  not 
known,  and  which  could  not  be,  while  a  Divine  providence  was 
not  recognized  over  all,  and  when  there  was  no  force  whatever, 
known  to  statesmen,  conjectured  by  philosophers,  by  which  a 
certain  moral  progress,  toward  ultimate  issues  of  liberty  and 
of  peace,  could  be  assured  to  the  multiform  clashing  societies  of 
mankind.  It  has  dissipated  the  fears  which  were  in  the  might- 
iest empire  of  the  earth,  when  it  began  its  novel  and  astounding 
work.  It  has  widened  the  view  encouraged  by  the  earlier 
Hebrew  system.  It  has  turned  the  general  gaze  of  men  from 
the  past,  to  which  they  were  wont  to  look  back  as  the  Golden 
Age,  toward  the  future  whose  promise  grows  more  inviting  as 
the  tread  of  the  centuries  approaches  it  nearer.  It  has  shown  in 
itself  the  power  to  reconcile,  to  liberate,  and  to  set  forward  na- 
tions, with  a  steadiness  and  a  strength  which  had  certainly  before 
been  unknown  in  the  world.  That  power  continues  absolutely 
unwasted  by  all  the  periods  which  have  witnessed  its  exercise, 
by  all  the  conflicts  through  which  it  has  passed.  It  has  never 
been  more  signally  declared  than  in  recent  years — in  amended 
legislations,  expanded  philanthropies,  widened  missions  ;  and  in- 
spired by  its  instinctive  energy,  as  well  as  taught  by  its  consume 
mating  prophecy,  the  peoples  who  receive  the  religion  of  the  Christ 
now  expect  each  century  to  be  brighter  than  the  past,  all  tending 
to  the  final  reign  on  the  earth  of  righteousness  and  of  wisdom. 
It  is  this  which  invigorates  every  effort  of  disciples  to  extend 
their  religion,  and  which  gives  to  their  prayer  impulse  and  joy. 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  327 

Tins  has  been  the  work  of  this  Christian  religion,  as  thus  far 
accomplished,  in  the  world  which  first  heard  it  from  Jesus  of 
Nazareth.  In  detail,  very  likely,  it  may  be  questioned  if  every 
particular  of  the  manifold  progress  to  which  I  have  referred  is 
to  be  ascribed  to  it  as  its  source.  And  I  have  not  hidden,  from 
your  eyes  or  from  mine,  the  fact  that  much  remains  to  be  ac- 
complished :  that  a  picture  might  even  now  be  drawn  of  Chris- 
tendom as  it  is,  of  this  very  city,  which  would  almost  tempt  one 
to  feel  for  the  moment  that  Christianity  itself  had  found  the 
wox'k  committed  to  it  too  vast  and  hard  to  be  performed,  the 
spirit  of  man  too  vehement  and  refractory  to  be  subdued ;  and 
that  the  promise  of  such  a  future  as  those  taught  by  it  fondly  con- 
template is  only  a  delightful  delusion  of  faith.  I  admit  the  justice 
of  much  of  that  sharp  condemnation  of  society  which  implies  a 
higher  standard  of  judgment  than  was  known  in  the  old  world, 
with  a  finer  and  more  imperative  sense  of  the  paramount  au- 
thority of  an  ideal  rectitude.  I  repeat,  too,  what  I  said  at  the 
beginning,  that  if  this  religion  did  come  from  God,  it  could  have 
come  only  because  there  was  imminent  moral  need  of  it ;  and 
that  therefore,  until  its  celestial  supremacy  is  wholly  complete, 
gi*eat  evils  must  be  expected  to  continue,  resistant  forces,  yet 
unconquered,  must  be  looked  for. 

In  spite  of  all  such,  it  seems  to  me  beyond  the  reach  of  intel- 
ligent dispute  that  the  broad,  permanent,  general  effects  to 
which  I  have  adverted,  have  been  the  result  of  the  coming  of 
this  religion  to  the  world.  In  the  aggregate,  I  see  not  how  they 
can  be  denied,  until  we  re-make  the  Past,  or  until  we  accept  the 
Indian  doctrine  that '  all  is  illusion,'  and  apply  it  to  Christendom. 
I  see  too  that  they  have  come,  not  as  casually  associated  with  the 
religion,  by  a  force  from  without,  but  as  vitally  involved  in  its 
constitution ;  made  necessary  by  palpable  elements  in  its  struc- 
ture;  which  none  will  dispute ;  proceeding  from  it  as  the  stream 
fj'om  its  source,  or  as  radiant  effulgence  from  the  substance  of 
the  sun.  Nor  is  it  true  here,  as  may  be  sometimes  elsewhere 
the  case,  that  the  many  particulars  hide  from  our  view  the  great 
general  outline,  so  that  one  '  cannot  see  the  forest,  on  account 
of  the  trees.'  The  vant  result  which  is  always  before  us,  in  the 
work  of  this  religion,  manifestly  and  mightily  transcends  the  most 


328  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

careful  catalogue  of  particulars.  The  world  is  a  new  one,  no» 
wholly,  but  surely  in  significant  measure,  since  Jesns  met  his 
death  on  the  cross.  And  there  is  no  sign  in  all  the  heavens  that 
the  influence  which  thus  has  emanated  from  him  is  now  or  here- 
after to  he  arrested  :  that  the  race  will  swing  back,  could  do  so  if  it 
wished,  to  the  spiritual  carelessness,  the  enthroned  cruelty,  the 
deified  lust,  of  the  earlier  time,  all  rooted  in  the  ignorance  of 
God  and  the  Hereafter.  Match  London,  or  Paris,  or  the  Rome 
of  to-day,  against  the  Rome  or  the  Corinth  of  Paul — match  the 
Colosseum  as  now  it  stands,  with  the  cross  in  its  centre,  against 
the  Colosseum  filled  with  its  thousands  of  shouting  spectators, 
looking  on  with  delight,  as  one  sees  them  outlined  in  the  picture 
of  G^rome,  at  the  horrible  slaughter  of  animals  or  of  men — and 
we  seem  to  be  on  a  different  planet.  The  victories  of  this  gen- 
tlest and  most  spiritual  of  Faiths,  have  surely,  thus  far,  been 
indisputably  grand. 

I  am  not  unmindful  of  the  fact,  which  I  hope  you  will  also 
clearly  recognize,  that  still  one  great  and  rich  department,  in 
some  respects  the  richest  of  all,  in  the  work  which  Christianity 
has  accomplished  in  the  world,  has  scarcely  been  touched  in  this 
series  of  Lectures  :  the  department,  that  is,  of  what  may  be  called 
its  individual  victories;  over  men  like  Augustine,  whom  it  con- 
verted, and  afterward  richly  instructed  and  inspired  ;  or  like 
Norbert,  of  the  twelfth  century,  whom  it  transformed,  on  occasion 
of  a  startling  natural  occurrence,  from  an  utterly  reckless  and 
dissolute  courtier,  into  an  apostolic  preacher,  whose  sermons 
flashed  the  fire  of  conviction  on  multitudes  of  hearts,  and  seemed 
to  open  Heaven  to  the  faithful.  Such  conquests  of  this  religion 
have  been  repeated  in  many  men  and  many  women  conspicuous 
in  history,  whom  it  has  brought  out  of  darkness  into  light,  out 
of  sin  into  holiness,  and  out  of  a  passionate  love  of  the  world 
into  fervent  and  supreme  adoration  of  God.  If  the  scheme  of 
these  Lectures  allowed  another  to  be  added  to  the  series,  no  other 
theme  could  have  been  so  inviting,  no  other,  I  think,  so  reward- 
ing to  our  thoughts,  as  the  one  thus  suggested  :  since  in  such  ex- 
amples we  see  brought,  as  it  were,  into  a  focus,  the  spiritual  en- 
ergies which  -elsewhere  are  exhibited  in  their  general  operation  ; 
and  the  impression  thence  resulting  is  like  that  of  the  sunbeam 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  3i^9. 

when  bj  the  lens  its  associated  rajs  are  concentered  upon  the 
hand.  The  flesh  which  before  had  hardly  felt  it,  then  responds 
to  its  touch  with  instant  thi-ill. 

Indeed,  such  instances  of  spiritual  victory  over  minds  and 
hearts  set  in  stubborn  resistance  to  its  appeals  are  in  themselves 
the  surpassing  effects  of  Christian  power;  clearest,  grandest,  and 
most  characteristic.  In  a  memorable  passage  by  Macaulay,  in 
his  essay  on  JVIitford's  History  of  Greece,  he  says  of  Athens, 
with  a  scholar's  enthusiasm :  "  Her  power  is  indeed  manifest  at 
the  bar,  in  the  senate,  on  the  field  of  battle,  in  the  schools  of 
philosophy.  But  these  are  not  her  glory.  Wherever  literature 
consoles  sorrow,  or  assuages  pain — wherever  it  brings  gladness 
to  eyes  which  fail  with  wakefulness  and  tears,  and  ache  for  the 
dark  house  and  the  long  sleep — there  is  exhibited,  in  its  noblest 
form,  the  immortal  influence  of  Athens."*  In  only  a  more 
reverent  and  affectionate  spirit,  and  surely  with  a  justice  still 
more  apparent,  we  may  say  of  Christianity,  that  while  it  trans- 
formed the  savage  and  sensual  life  of  the  empire,  while  it  mas- 
tered the  barbarians  who  broke  upon  that  in  successive  terrific 
inundations  of  destruction,  while  it  has  cnanged  the  face  of 
Europe,  building  cathedrals,  hospitals,  universities,  and  has 
covered  this  country  with  at  least  the  foundations  and  lower 
stories  of  its  appropriate  civilization,  while  it  has  made  the  en- 
lightened and  aspiring  Christendom  of  to-day  the  fact  of  chief 
importance  thus  far  in  the  progress  of  mankind — its  true  glory 
is  that  it  has  wiped  the  tears  of  sorrow  from  the  eyes  of  its  dis- 
ciples, and  has  comforted  hearts  which  were  desolate  with  grief; 
that  it  has  given  celestial  visions  to  those  who  dw^elt  beneath 
thatched  roofs,  and  has  taught  a  happier  humility  to  the  proud ; 
that  it  has  shed  victorious  tranquillity  on  those  who  have  seen 
the  shadows  of  death  closing  around  them,  and  has  caused  to  be 
written  over  their  graves  the  lofty  worJs  of  promise  and  cheer, 
"  I  am  the  Eesurrection  and  the  Life." 

This  is  the  diadem  of  this  religion  :  sparkling  with  gems,  lucid 
and  vivid,  such  as  never  were  set  in  any  philosophic  or  poetic 
crown.     Because  of  these  effects,  and  not  merely  for  its  inflit 


*  Works:  London  ed.,  1873 :  Vol.  VII. :  p.  703. 


330  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARQVMENT, 

ences  upon  cosraical  progress,  men  have  loved  this  religion  with 
a  passionate  intensity  beside  which  all  other  enthusiasms  wera 
weak.  Because  of  these,  if  for  nothing  else,  it  will  live  in  the 
world  till  human  hearts  have  ceased  to  beat. 

But  to  all  this  vast  and  alluring  theme  I  can  only  thus  refer 
in  a  word,  and  mast  trust  your  own  thought,  it  may  be  I  hope 
your  own  experience,  to  show  how  the  Faith  preached  in  Judea 
still  touches  the  heart,  in  all  its  critical,  fateful  moments,  as  with 
an  energy  coming  from  God.  It  speaks  to  us  through  languages 
wholly  unknown  to  those  who  proclaimed  it  at  Antioch  or  at 
Corinth,  upon  a  continent  not  prefigured  by  any  reminiscence 
of  the  lost  Atlantis,  and  toward  which  the  imperial  eagles  of 
Rome  never  had  turned  their  haughty  eyes.  But  it  is,  to-day, 
the  life  of  the  life  in  millions  of  spirits,  over  which  bend  the 
heavens  which  it  has  illumined,  upon  which  fall  the  premonitory 
lights  of  that  great  Immortality  which  through  its  Master  has 
been  manifested  to  men. 

But  leaving  this,  and  looking  only  at  what  I  have  been  able 
imperfectly  to  treat,  I  certainly  am  not  timid  in  asking.  What  is 
the  fair  inference  from  it  all  ?  Have  not  the  facts  already  out- 
lined been  sufficient,  at  least,  to  justify  the  thought  with  which  I 
commenced:  that  enough  is  apparent  in  this  track  of  incj^uiry  to 
warrant,  to  demand,  from  every  one,  the  most  careful  and  earn- 
est study  of  Christianity  in  its  characteristic  and  vital  contents, 
as  probably  from  God  ?  enough  to  impel  us,  when  we  are  thus 
assured  of  its  nature,  to  make  a  personal  experiment  of  it,  ac- 
cording to  its  law  ? 

I  do  not  wish  to  exaggerate  anything ;  but  it  seems  to  me  in- 
disputably clear  that  so  much,  at  any  rate,  has  been  attained,  and 
that  while  Christianity  cannot  be  scientifically  demonstrated,  it 
is  most  surely  indicated,  by  these  unique  historical  effects,  as 
having  had  its  lofty  origin,  not  on  earth,  but  in  the  mind  which 
had  ordained  and  which  perfectly  knew  the  soul  in  man,  and 
which  could  not  be  unmindful  of  the  wants  of  that  soul,  or  of 
the  attaniments  which  are  possible  to  it.  The  fountain  cannot 
rise  higher  than  the  spring.  The  vast,  shining,  perpetual  up- 
spring  of  these  immense  and  world-wide  effects — it  seems  to  me 
absolutely  incredible  that  the  source  of  it  all  was  in  a  sensitive 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGEISTIOJ^S.  331 

Jewish  brain  in  the  workshop  of  Joseph,  and  in  an  unbroken 
garden-grave.  The  origin  of  Christendom  cannot  fairly  be  ex- 
plained by  the  terse  and  trenchant  sarcasm  of  Ebrard,  com^ 
menting  upon  the  notion  that  the  narrative  of  John  is  a  sort  of 
philosophical  and  poetical  romance :  '  At  that  time  it  came  to 
pass — that  nothing  happened ! ' 

At  this  point,  then,  observe  still  further  some  other  things 
connected  in  history  with  this  religion, — especially  this:  how 
suddenly  it  broke  forth  upon  a  race  which  was  not  in  the  least 
expecting  its  coming,  which  seemed  almost  as  far  as  possible 
from  being  prepared  to  accept  and  absorb  it  with  intelligent 
faith,  yet  in  which  certain  preparations  had  been  made,  appar- 
ently for  its  introduction  to  mankind,  which  at  least  distinctly 
agree  with  the  thought  that  a  vigilance  overhead  was  concerned 
in  its  coming,  and  that  a  plan  not  of  human  device  was  in  that 
fulfilled. 

It  has  sometimes  been  made  an  objection  to  Christianity,  in 
its  claim  to  supreme  Divine  authority,  that  maxims  are  found 
in  it  which  were  not  unknown  in  other  systems,  and  declarations 
of  fact  which  find  resemblances,  if  not  exact  or  equivalent  coun- 
terparts, in  other  religions.  Undoubtedly  this  is  true.  We 
know  distinctly  what  the  principal  prevalent  religions  of  the 
world,  outside  of  Palestine,  essentially  were,  in  their  own  na- 
ture, in  their  historical  development,  and  in  their  moral 
and  social  influence.  Yet  when  we  know  also  that  Aratus 
said,  whom  Cicero  translated,  and  from  whom  Paul  quoted, 
*  full  of  Zeus  are  all  the  streets  and  market-places,  full  of  Him 
are  all  seas  and  harbors,  .  .  and  we  are  also  His  offspring ': 
when  we  hear  Seneca  say  that  *  between  good  men  and  the 
gods  there  exists  a  friendship,  or  rather  a  certain  relationship 
and  resemblance,'  that  '  the  mind  came  from  God,  and  yearns  to- 
ward Him,'  that  '  a  sacred  spirit  resides  within  us,  and  no  good 
man  is  without  God,'  that  '  the  first  and  greatest  punishment  of 
the  sinner  is  the  fact  of  having  sinned,'  that  *  we  should  so  give 
as  we  would  wish  in  turn  to  receive,'  and  that  a  perfect  man  in 
the  world  '  would  be  like  a  light  shining  in  darkness ';  when  we 
read  in  the  Buddhist  Dhammapada  that  '  the  evil-doer  mourns 
in  this  world,  and  he  mourns  in  the  next,'  that  '  wise  people, 


332  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

after  they  have  listened  to  the  laws,  become  serene,  like  a  deep, 
smooth,  and  silent  lake,'  that  ^happiness  is  the  outcome  oi 
goodness,'  and  that  'not  to  commit  any  sin,  to  do  good,  and  tc 
purify  one's  mind,  that  is  the  teaching  of  the  Awakened':  when 
we  read  such  discerning  and  monitory  words,  and  know  that 
they  were  written  by  men  who  could  not  have  heard,  except 
possibly  in  the  instance  of  Seneca,  the  name  of  Christ: — and 
when  we  remember,  further  than  this,  that  in  a  subsequent 
stage  of  the  Hindu  development,  among  the  various  avatars  of 
Vishnu,  was  reckoned  a  docetic  incarnation  in  Krishna,  the  hero 
who  came  to  lighten  men's  burdens,  and  as  a  great  Teacher  to 
save  mankind,  who,  amid  much  that  was  frivolous  and  much 
that  was  lascivious,  vanquished  serpents,  overcame  demons,  and 
at  last  defeated  the  gods  themselves:  above  all,  when  we  read 
the  wish  attributed  to  Buddha,  '  that  all  the  sin  of  the  world 
might  fall  on  him,  that  the  world  thereby  might  be  delivered,' — 
we  are  tempted  to  ask.  What  is  there,  what  can  there  be,  in 
Christianity,  which  in  essence  transcends  all  this  ?  "Was  it  not, 
after  all,  like  these  other  systems,  a  human  development  out  of 
principles  recognized  by  the  natural  conscience?  a  majestic  but 
still  a  terrestrial  consummation  of  ethical  maxims,  spiritual  yearn- 
ings, mysterious  fancies,  which  had  appeared  among  other  peo- 
ples, but  which  iinally  took  this  lofty  and  rich  historical  form, 
and  which  since  have  commanded  such  astonishing  influence  ? 

T  think  the  doubt  thus  suggested  the  subtlest  and  strongest 
which  any  ingenuous  mind  can  feel  concerning  Christianity.  It 
seems  to  leave  the  intrinsic  spiritual  splendor  of  that  substantial- 
ly undimmed,  while  ascribing  it  all  to  an  earthly  origin.  It  has 
the  charm  of  free  and  wide  sympathy  toward  other  religions, 
among  which  Christianity  is  recognized  as  one  of  a  similar  na- 
ture, though  extolled  as  the  best.  And  it  leaves  each  student  of 
this  religion  to  take  from  it  what  he  likes,  rejecting  the  rest,  and 
to  feel  bound  by  no  limitations  from  supernal  authority,  only 
animated  and  instructed  by  great  human  suggestions,  in  what  he 
takes  or  in  what  he  rejects. 

Fully  to  respond  to  this  far-reaching  question,  and  to  show 
how  essentially  and  loftily  dissimilar  Christianity  is  to  the 
various  religions  which  preceded  or  surrounded  it,  would  obvi- 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  833 

oiisly  require  a  careful  and  full  analysis  of  its  contents,  as  com 
parcfl  with  those  of  other  systems;  but  from  such  analysis  1 
have  carefully  refrained  in  this  series  of  Lectures.  I  have  been 
standing  outside  the  religion,  rather  than  within  it :  taking  only 
those  obvious  undeniable  elements  which  all  recognize  at  first 
Bight,  and  showing  how,  hy  reason  of  them  and  of  whatsoever 
else  was  associated  with  them,  it  has  modified  liistory.  The  fur- 
ther work,  of  investigating  at  large,  and  with  accurate  scrutiny, 
the  intimate,  distinctive,  and  governing  principles  confederated 
in  it,  I  have  left  with  intention  to  your  subsequent  studies. 
That  it  must  involve  such  preeminent  principles  appears  indis- 
putable from  the  fact  that  it  has  had  and  still  retains  so  large  a 
place  in  the  world's  history,  and  has  been  the  source  of  such  cos- 
mieal  beneficence.  But  what  they  are,  and  how  they  are  properly 
combined  and  coordinated  in  a  systematic  theological  scheme,  I 
have  wholly  remitted  to  your  personal  inquiry :  only  seeking  to 
do  a  simpler  and  humbler  preliminary  work,  and  to  give  you 
«uch  impressions  as  may  possibly  prepare  you  the  better  to  ac- 
complish this  nobler  task. 

I  am  not  therefore  now  in  the  proper  position  to  put  Christi- 
anity in  fair  measurement  of  comparison  with  other  religions,  so 
far  as  its  organic  structure  is  concerned.  I  can  only  suggest  a 
few  thoughts,  from  a  point  of  view  still  outside  the  analysis  of 
the  system,  which  seem  to  me  to  have  a  just  and  an  important 
bearing  upon  the  question  thus  presented. 

However  especially  and  transcend  en  tly  Divine  Christianity 
may  appear  to  any  of  its  disciples,  there  is  certainly  nothing 
unaccountable,  or  properly  unexpected,  in  the  fact  that  partial 
resemblances  to  it,  at  various  points,  even  pregnant  suggestions 
looking  and  possibly  leading  toward  it,  should  have  appeared  at 
different  times,  and  among  widely  differing  peoples.  Christiani- 
ty itself  not  only  authorizes  but  instructs  us  to  expect  this,  by 
those  teachings  concerning  human  nature  which  lie  as  palpably 
on  its  surface  as  do  the  examples  of  gold-bearing  quartz  above 
the  mine.  It  is  always  thus  to  be  remembered  that,  according  to 
the  tenor  of  New  Testament  teaching,  God  never  had  left  Hira- 
Belf  without  witness  among  men,  in  giving  them  rain  from 
heaven,  and  fruitful  seasons,  filling  their  hearts  with  food  and 


334  ^  RBYIEW  OJ^   THE  ARGUMENT, 

gladness;*  that  they  had  had  a  law  implanted  in  the  consciences 
though  the  written  law  was  not  before  them ;  and  that  there, 
fore,  as  Paul  argues,  they  were  in  fact  without  excuse,  because 
when  they  knew  God  they  glorified  Him  not  as  God,  neither 
were  thankful. f  The  undestroyed  sensibility  of  the  soul  to  what 
is  Divine,  is  the  primary  postulate  of  Christianity,  as  it  is  the 
authoritative  verdict  of  history.  It  constantly  reappears,  this 
innate  sensibility,  in  religions,  household  customs,  sometimes  in 
poems,  often  in  arts.  It  was  this  which  made  human  experience 
moral,  and  not  like  that  of  beavers  or  birds.  Though,  according 
to  the  energetic  apostle,  men  were  alienated  from  the  life  of 
God,  through  the  ignorance  which  was  in  them  because  of  the 
blindness  of  their  heart,:]:  they  were  by  nature,  in  the  Christian 
contemplation,  allied  with  the  Deity ;  they  had  had  early  dis- 
coveries of  Him ;  they  had  innate  tendencies  pressing  them  to- 
ward Him ;  they  had  even  imperative  intuitions,  of  which  no 
vicious  disposition  could  rid  them,  declaring  the  unseen  and  the 
supernal;  and  they  could  not  as  a  race  become  atheistic,  even  if 
they  tried.  Therefore  Christianity  had  been  sent  to  address 
them ;  and  therefore,  only,  could  it  exercise  upon  them  such  a 
power  for  their  mental  and  moral  inspiration  as  that  whose  effects 
we  have  rapidly  traced. 

If  this  conception  of  the  nature  of  man  be  a  correct  one,  it 
was  plainly  to  be  anticipated — where  there  had  been  a  primitive 
knowledge  of  God  and  His  will,  where  were  souls  made  in  His 
image,  and  which  still  retained  that  in  faculty  if  not  in  spiritual 
temper,  where  the  heavens  were  all  the  time  telling  from  above, 
and  the  earth  from  beneath,  of  the  power  and  foresight  from  which 
they  had  sprung,  where  it  is  affirmed,  on  the  front  of  one  of  the 
principal  gospels,  that  there  had  been  some  Light,  whatever  that 
is  conceived  to  have  been,  which  lighteth  every  man  that  cometh 
into  the  world,  and  where  it  had  been  predicted  beforehand  that 
One  "  the  Desire  of  all  nations  "  was  to  come — that  there  should 
be  adumbrations,  going  before,  of  whatever  religion  might 
be  at  last  divinely  sent ;  that  philosophical  maxims  would  show 
preparatory  elements  of  truth ;  that  religious  institutions  would 
sometimes  contain  the  flas'.es  and  gleams  of  a  true  radiance; 

*  Acts  xiv.  15-17.  t  Romans  i.  19-21.  J  Ei^besians  iv.  18. 


WITH  ADDED  mOQE^TIONS.  335 

that  here  and  there  expectant  spirits,  yearning  for  what  they 
had  not  found,  might  catch  foreshadowings  of  what  ultimately 
should  appear,  to  bring  them  nearer  to  their  Maker,  and  mighl 
take  from  these  a  prophesying  brightness — as  the  cloud  which 
rises  in  the  morning-horizon  before  the  sun,  though  dark  at  it? 
centre,  is  rimmed  on  its  edges  with  crinkling  gold.  Premoni- 
tions of  this  sort,  high  imaginings,  were  surely  to  be  expected, 
if  the  account  given  by  Christianity  of  the  origin  of  man,  and  of 
Lis  nature,  be  the  correct  one ;  while,  in  the  entire  absence  of  such, 
a  celestial  religion,  no  matter  with  what  of  miracle  attended, 
would  have  had  apparently  no  point  of  contact  with  the  spirit  in 
man.  Its  appeal  must  have  been  as  a  summons  to  the  heart  in 
a  bronze  figure ;  or,  certainly,  as  an  attempt  to  teach  rabbits  and 
ravens  the  higher  mathematics. 

It  is  natural  to  expect  such  *  unconscious  prophecies '  of  what 
at  last  may  appear,  from  the  nature  in  man :  and  they  plainly 
constitute,  in  a  sense  most  important,  an  appropriate  preparation 
for  a  final  majestic  religion  of  God,  though  it  seems  as  certain  as 
anything  in  history  that  they  never  were  enough  to  constitute  of 
themselves  a  separate,  sufficient,  and  ultimate  Faith.  Any  relig- 
ion coming  from  the  Heavens  without  some  antecedents  of  this 
kind  must  have  had  the  effect  of  a  sun  bolting  up  into  a  sky  of 
ebon  darkness,  to  irradiate  the  world  with  rash,  flaming,  intol- 
erable splendor.  Such  ethical  maxims  as  I  have  cited,  and  such 
dreams  of  the  possible  exhibition  of  God  in  human  nature, 
which  yet  never  were  compacted  into  a  peculiar  and  positive  re- 
ligion of  cosmical  relations,  impress  one  as  precursory  rays  of 
light,  palpitating,  flickering,  and  gradually  mingling  above  the 
horizon,  to  turn  the  darkness  to  partial  dawn,  before  the  illuminat- 
ing orb  appears.  In  this  sense  it  is  certainly  the  fact,  according 
to  Augustine's  thought,  that  '  there  are  grains  of  truth  in  all  re- 
ligions ';  that  others  than  Hebrews  had  been  in  time  past  of  the 
spiritual  Israel;  that  those  speaking  Divine  things  before  the 
Master  were  to  be  congratulated,  if  not  to  be  followed ;  and  that 
Christianity  is,  in  a  sense, '  as  old  as  the  creation.'  We  understand 
how  Justin  Martyr  should  have  felt  that  Christ  had  been  par. 
fcially  intimated  in  Socrates.*     The  ethnic  religions  were  never 

*  Apol.  II. :  c.  10. 


336  ^  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

able  to  build  up  in  man  a  life  harmonious  with  even  the  higher 
philosophical  precepts.  They  could  not  give — did  not  seek  tc 
^give — a  consciousness  of  sweet  and  purifying  communion  with  a 
holy  Creator,  whose  love  was  immortal  as  His  power.  The  bur- 
den of  sin  they  could  not  lift,  from  any  troubled  and  travailing 
soul,  by  authentic  promises  of  forgiveness.  The  transformation 
of  the  spirit  in  man  from  pride  or  fear  into  the  humble  yet  joy 
ful  tranquillity  of  self-consecrating  affection  toward  an  invisible 
King  in  his  beauty,  was  something  outside  their  range  of  effort. 
But  we  may  not  overlook,  or  momently  depreciate,  any  virtue 
of  thought  or  aim  manifest  in  them.  It  only  shows  how  much 
more  was  needed  than  they  could  furnish,  to  rectify  man's  spir- 
itual life.  It  only  adds,  for  a  discerning  disciple,  to  the  glory  of 
him  in  whom  such  scattered  preceding  intimations  appear  sub- 
limely completed  and  surpassed.  If  God  at  last  did  send  a 
religion,  appropriate  to  Himself,  for  all  mankind,  for  all  coming 
ages,  these  bursts  of  aspiration,  these  uncertain  yet  elevating  ap- 
prehensions of  verity,  these  evanescent  foreshado wings,  only  show 
how  long  and  how  widely  He  wrought — though  in  a  silence  like 
that  which  attends  the  motion  of  stars — preparing  the  way  for 
the  final  discovery  of  it. 

But  another  thing  carefully  to  be  noted  is  this :  that  however 
numerous,  or  however  signal,  such  pre-Christian  or  extra-Christian 
indications  may  have  been  of  what  at  last  becomes  manifest  in 
the  Gospel,  the  new  religion  did  not  come  by  natural  develop, 
ment  from  any  one  preceding,  or  from  all  of  them  combined. 
It  was  not  the  result  of  a  shrewd  eclecticism,  which  sought  to 
blend  certain  elements  of  each  in  a  wider  scheme  of  reconciliation. 
Still  less  was  it  a  crass  syncretism,  equally  ready  to  authorize  all, 
making  no  essential  distinctions  between  them.  Efforts  of  thift 
sort  were  abundantly  made  at  a  later  time,  in  the  Gnostic  de- 
velopment; and  what  came  of  them,  he  who  runs  may  read. 
But  whatever  else  it  is,  or  is  not,  Christianity,  as  apparent 
throughout  the  New  Testament,  is  at  least,  to  the  most  cursory 
observation,  a  system  peculiar  and  self-contained  :  with  its  own 
affirmations  of  alleged  Divine  and  invisible  facts,  and  its  special 
maxims  of  duty  and  truth  founded  upon  them :  with  an  interior 
law  and  life  of  self-development  as  absolutely  belonging  to  itself 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  337 

s&  tliose  of  tree,  animal,  man,  Ijelong  to  the  organisms  in  which 
thej  are  expressed.  No  one  has  established  an  effort  in  it  to 
borrow  from  other  religious  schemes.  It  is  in  fact  as  independ- 
ent of  those  which  the  world  had  elaborated,  outside  of  Pales- 
tine, as  if  they  had  been  non-existent ;  and  in  its  effect  is  contra- 
dictory and  expulsive  of  their  fundamental  practices  and  ideas. 

The  only  religion  with  which  it  had  intimate  or  vital  relations 
was  that  of  the  Hebrews ;  to  which  it  gives  continual  honor,  as 
^  Divine  preparatory  system,  intended  to  teach  the  basal  doctrine 
on  which  its  crowning  structure  should  be  reared ;  whose  glo- 
rious completeness  should  be  realized  in  it;  and  which  should 
take  from  it  fresh  illustration  on  whatever  in  itself  was  of  cardi- 
nal importance,  or  of  secular  meaning.  The  relation  of  Chris- 
tianity to  the  system  which  came  before  by  Moses  is  one  which 
the  writers  who  first  proclaim  it  are  never  weary  of  presenting. 
The  Master  himself,  according  to  them,  makes  it  often  impres- 
sively prominent.  It  is  still  apparent  to  every  student  who  ex- 
amines the  records,  old  and  new. 

But  how  far  the  later  religion  was  from  being  in  any  sense  a 
spontaneous  development  out  of  the  earlier,  appears  on  the  instant 
demonstrated  by  the  fact  that  from  the  very  people  whom  that 
had  trained  came  the  first  and  fiercest  resistance  to  it,  and  that 
from  them  proceeded  afterward,  as  it  has  done  to  this  day,  the 
most  strenuous,  stubborn,  and  relentless  hostility  to  the  whole 
-Christian  scheme.  It  was  not  the  feeling  of  one  man  only,  or 
another,  whether  scribe  or  pharisee,  Herodian  or  Essene,  it  was 
the  instinctive  judgment  of  the  nation,  that  this  religion  which 
had  come  out  of  Galilee  was  something  apart  from,  or  essentially 
above,  what  they  had  received  in  inheritance  from  the  Past; 
that  instead  of  being  an  outgrowth  from  that,  it  was  a  system 
claiming  so  transcendently  to  supplement  and  sui-pass  it,  that  by 
inevitable  force  it  must  suspend  it,  and  if  generally  accepted  must 
leave  for  that  earlier  and  venerated  economy  no  place  but  in 
history.  Therefore  they  fought  it  so  fiercely  as  they  did. 
Therefore,  as  a  people,  they  maintain  toward  it  the  old  antago- 
nism. And  therefore  when  one  trained  by  that  system  now  ac- 
cepts Christianity,  it  is  with  a  violent  wrench  of  the  spirit,  un- 
der the  impulse  of  its  powerful  motives,  such  as  the  heathen  do 
22 


-J38  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

not  know  when  abolishing  their  temples  and  burning  theii 
gods.  The  Jew  crosses  a  chasm,  he  does  not  merely  ascend  b^ 
Bteps  from  one  court  to  another,  in  coming  to  Christ.  The  boy 
Mendel  becomes  the  E^eander — the  veritable  "  new  man  " — when 
baptized  to  the  Lord. 

It  is  hard  to  conceive  how  any  demonstration  of  any  fact 
could  be  furnished  in  history,  more  complete  than  is  that  which 
thus  is  given,  by  the  Hebrews  themselves,  to  the  fact  that  Chris- 
tianity, as  it  stands  in  the  New  Testament,  is  not  a  mere  flower- 
ing into  larger  proportion  and  lovelier  beauty  of  the  religion 
which  they  had  possessed.  I  cannot  but  feel  that  the  more  care- 
fully and  profoundly  one  studies  the  system,  the  clearer  and  tha 
deeper  will  be  his  conviction  that  in  this  they  were  right.  The 
later  religion  was  in  a  true  sense  based  on  tlie  earlier,  and  pre- 
supposed it.  It  was  the  Pleroma,  of  which  that  had  been  the 
prophecy.  That  had  presented  the  preliminary  truths,  the  ru- 
brical precepts,  the  solemn  and  significant  symbols,  which  were 
the  heralds  and  advanced  pioneers  of  its  bright  armies.  But 
they  take  illustration  and  importance  from  it,  not  it  from  them. 
And  there  is  no  conceivable  law  of  moral  evolution,  by  incon- 
siderable variations,  gradually  established,  and  resulting  at  last, 
through  constant  increments,  in  a  fixed  and  definite  change  of 
type,  which  can  possibly  account  for  the  coming  of  Christianity 
out  of  Judaism.  It  was  a  "new  doctrine"  which  the  Jew 
heard  from  Jesus ;  and  because  it  was  new,  and  still  so  impera- 
tive, he  shut  his  ears  against  its  teaching,  he  answered  it  with 
stones,  and  he  finally  slew  the  Master  who  had  brought  it. 

But  if  Christianity  was  not  a  development  out  of  Judaism, 
assuredly  it  was  not  from  any  other  religion  known  on  the  earth. 
The  attempts  of  writers  like  Bruno  Bauer  to  trace  its  origin  to 
commingled  elements  of  Eoman  and  Hellenic  thought,  though 
once  assuming  a  temporary  prominence,  have  long  since  ceased 
to  attract  attention.  If  referred  to  at  all,  it  is  only  with  ridicule, 
even  by  those  who  equally  desire  to  find  in  the  new  Faith  a 
human  development  out  of  preceding  systems,  but  who  certainly 
know  that  its  germinating  principle  is  not  to  be  looked  for  on 
the  banks  of  the  Ilissus  or  of  the  Tiber.*     It  is  not  there ;  nor 


*  See  Kuenen's  "  Hibbert  Lectures  "  :  New  York  ed.,  1883 :  pp.  -203-4. 


WITH  ADDED  SUQ9ESTI0NS.  339 

is  it  in  the  fantastic  and  transitor}^  scheme  of  those  aspiring  Alex- 
andiian  philosophers,  represented  by  Fhilo,  who  accepted  the 
divinity  of  the  Hebrew  scriptures,  but  who  sought  to  associate 
with  their  teachings,  on  equal  terms,  philosophical  speculations 
derived  from  the  Greeks:  w^ho  therefore  forced  allegorical 
meanings  on  Hebrew  texts,  to  make  these  cover  what  they  con- 
ceived universal  ideas ;  and  who  reached  at  last  a  mystical  ra- 
tionalism, as  their  supreme  truth  in  the  sphere  of  religion. 
Christianity  is  as  centrally  and  sharply  discriminated  from  such 
a  tendency,  and  from  its  recorded  speculative  fruits,  as  it  is 
from  the  worship  of  crocodiles  or  of  cats. 

Undoubtedly,  occasional  resemblances  appear  between  the  elab- 
orated verbal  economy  through  which  the  Alexandrian  scheme 
found  expression,  and  that  which  is  employed  in  passages  and 
sections  of  the  Christian  scriptures.  Especially  the  term  '  Lo- 
gos ' — which  had  been  derived  from  Old  Testament  scriptures, 
which  appeared  later  in  Apocryphal  books,  and  in  subsequent 
Targums — was  frequently  and  gladly  employed  by  Philo,  and 
gained  through  him  wider  currency  in  the  world ;  and  this  is 
the  term  preeminently  used  by  the  writer  of  the  fourth  gospel, 
as  personally  descriptive  of  the  Lord  whom  he  celebrates.  But 
to  infer  equivalence,  or  resemblance,  or  genetic  relationship,  be- 
tween their  doctrines,  from  their  common  employment  of  this 
word  or  of  others,  would* be  immensely  wide  of  the  mark.  Words 
are  related  through  contents,  not  form.  *Sin'  means  with  one 
man  an  offence  against  good  manners  or  taste,  and  with  another 
rebellion  against  God.  'Death'  means  with  one  extinction  of 
being,  and  with  another  the  birth-time  of  Immortality.  Yet 
both  employ  the  identical  word,  if  associated  letters  constitute 
identity.  In  just  this  way  the  whole  Greek  language,  as  far  as 
they  needed  it,  was  used  by  the  New  Testament  writers,  not  as 
having  previously  contained  their  ideas,  but  as  being  capable 
beyond  any  other  of  receiving  these  into  it,  and  of  giving  them 
expression ;  as  having  such  capacity  for  regeneration  that  its 
adopted  Hnguistic  forms,  though  never  before  in  the  least 
des(U*iptive  of  Christian  thought  or  evangelical  experience,  could; 
be  lifted  and  spiritualized  until  they  contained  these.  In  this 
way  the  term  '  Logos '  was  accepted,  but  in  a  definiteness  of  mean- 


340  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

ing,  and  with  a  sublimity  of  personal  application,  not  prevfouslj 
contemplated ;  and  was  made  to  stand,  in  its  new  majesty,  as  a 
vital  and  almost  a  sovereign  term  in  a  system  of  thought  so 
diverse  from  that  of  Philo  and  his  friends  that  theirs  formed,  as 
Dorner  has  said,  "  the  directest  antithesis  to  Christianity."*  It 
ficems  naturally  related,  this  Alexandrian  scheme,  to  the  Gnosti- 
cism which  followed,  and  which  already  was  beginning  to  be  un- 
folded in  the  time  of  St.  Paul.  But  it  does  not  tend  toward,  it 
is  not  even  indifferent  to,  the  !N"ew  Testament  religion.  That 
stood  at  the  beginning,  as  it  has  done  since,  alone  in  the  world : 
to  be  believed,  obeyed,  and  loved,  for  its  own  majestic  lessons,  if 
at  all:  to  be  discredited  and  rejected  bj  men,  if  it  does  not  es- 
sentially depart  from  and  transcend  all  other  religions.  This 
belongs  to  its  nature. 

Its  Teacher  had  been  taught  in  no  Greek  or  Roman  or  Alex- 
andnan  school.  He  was  not  even  learned,  as  Moses  had  been,  in 
Egyptian  wisdom.  He  acknowledged  no  dependence  w^iatever, 
so  far  as  the  utmost  diligence  can  trace,  on  Hellenic  conceptions, 
or  even  on  prevalent  Jewish  traditions.  lie  amended  and 
spiritualized,  without  hesitation,  the  law  of  Moses.  He  an- 
nounced thoughts  which  even  his  trained  personal  disciples 
were  wholly  unable  to  understand ;  by  which  the  people,  as  at 
Capernaum,  were  astonished  and  repulsed ;  by  which  the  minds 
of  principal  authority  to  which  they  were  addressed  were  keenly 
enraged.  He  presented  what  he  taught  as  having  immediate 
and  peremptory  claim  on  the  acceptance  and  faithful  obedience 
of  all  who  heard  it.  He  recognized  no  other  scheme  of  thought 
as  synonymous  with  his  own,  or  as  its  equivalent,  only  one  as 
having  been  preparatory  to  it:  itself  incapable,  by  its  nature,  of 
affiliating  with  others,  simply,  inevitably,  exclusive  of  them.  It 
came  suddenly,  this  separate,  imperious,  and  expulsive  religion  : 
when  neither  the  Jewish  world  nor  the  Gentile  was  expecting 
such  a  system ;  when  the  Jew  was  looking  with  eager  desire  for 
a  secular  Messiah,  not  at  all  for  a  dying  Teacher  and  Saviour ; 
when  the  Gentile  world  was  intensely  preoccupied  with  the 
contemplation  of  Roman  power,  and  the  adoration  of  imperial 


»  "Person  of  Christ":  Edinburgh  §d.,  1861 :  Vol.  I.:  p.  19. 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  34| 

Gods.  Then  this  religion  broke  into  history:  and  in  spite  of 
the  apparent  obscurity  of  its  origin,  in  spite  of  the  slight  and 
limited  impression  which  was  all  that  it  could  make  on  those 
who  heard  the  voice  of  Jesus,  it  undertook  to  fill,  possess,  and 
renovate  the  world. 

In  the  physical  world  there  is  a  great  gulf,  fixed,  between 
matter,  in  any. dexterous  arrangement,  and  the  life  which  impene- 
trates, governs,  up-builds  that  into  organic  forms.  A  great 
gulf  is  fixed  between  the  highest  faculty  of  the  brute,  with 
whatever  skill  of  instinct  endowed,  or  whatever  strange  power 
of  limb  or  wing,  and  the  reasoning,  imaginative,  conscientious, 
and  worshipping  spirit  of  man.  ]N'o  one  yet  has  bridged  these 
chasms.  Spontaneous  generation  is  a  discredited  hypothesis. 
However  eager  any  man  may  be  to  find  that  he  had  an  ape  for 
his  grandfather,  he  cannot  yet  trace  the  physical  relationship. 
In  like  manner,  yet  more  pi'ofoundly,  a  great  gulf  is  fixed  be- 
tween Christianity  and  any  other  scheme  of  religion  which  ante- 
dated or  synchronized  with  it.  The  separateness  of  its  results,  as 
shown  in  history,  is  itself  the  demonstration  of  its  separateness 
of  nature.  So  unique  in  effect,  it  must  be  equally  unique  in 
constitution.  A  something  wholly  unmeasured  and  transcend^ 
ent,  in  spirit  and  power,  came  with  a  bound  into  the  world, 
leaping  upon  the  mountains,  when  the  word  of  the  Gospel  was 
preached  in  Galilee.  It  was  not  a  development,  but  an  announce- 
ment. There  is  a  positive  break  of  continuity  in  the  series  of 
history,  at  its  appearance,  far  more  than  answering  to  the  inter- 
val of  centuries  between  the  last  prophet  and  the  advent  of 
Jesus.  We  are  in  another  atmosphere  when  we  have  entered 
the  sphere  of  Christianity  :  with  another  radiance  falling  through 
it,  and  another  effect  of  moral  stimulation  proceeding  from  it 

So  capital,  sudden,  immense  a  change,  if  it  contradicts  anything, 
contradicts  above  all  the  notion  that  it  came — this  religion — by 
any  forces  of  evolution  the  alleged  law  of  which  has  ever  been 
formulated.  The  palingenesia  of  a  moribund  world  did  not 
arise  from  ethical  speculations,  from  scattered  surmises  and 
Lopes  of  men,  or  out  of  the  ancient  law  of  Moses.  When  matched 
against  the  noblest  preceding  scheme,  it  is  as  a  power  enthroned 
in  the  sun,  compared  with  a  po'wer  regnant  from  echoing  rocks 


342  ^  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

of  Sinai.  The  fact  that  nothing  has  even  jet  come  to  surpass 
and  replace  it,  after  all  the  enormous  activity  of  mankind  in 
ethical  inquiry,  in  spiritual  experience,  and  in  speculative 
thought,  since  it  was  published,  seems  sufficient  to  demonstrate 
Divinest  truth  in  the  words  of  its  Teacher,  who  said,  according 
to  the  early  record,  to  the  most  religiously  instructed  and  exact 
of  the  world  in  his  time :  "  Ye  are  from  beneath ;  I  am  from 
above.  Ye  are  of  this  world;  I  am  not  of  this  world  !"  An 
arrogance  of  egotistical  boast  surpassing  parallel  is  in  these  words, 
or  else  the  sublime  and  victorious  calm  of  a  just  and  temperate 
self-affirmation.  And  History  tells  us,  with  the  irresistible  and 
undying  consent  of  her  millions  of  voices,  which  it  was ! 

Yet  while  this  system  of  religion  thus  stands  apart  from  every 
other,  in  essential  and  permanent  preeminence  of  nature,  it  is 
important  to  notice  what  special  arrangements  had  apparently 
been  made  for  it,  that  at  the  time  when  it  appeared  it  might 
have  large  and  swift  extension,  reaching  most  rapidly  the  most 
numerous  hearers,  and  becoming  very  early  an  established  power 
in  the  principal  and  controlling  civilizations  of  the  world.  A  vast 
plan  concerning  it  seems  here  iuipressively  evident. 

Three  centuries  before,  Alexander  had  marched,  as  in  a  vast 
victorious  raid,  across  the  Asian  expanses,  from  the  Hellespont 
to  the  Hyphasis,  or  almost  to  the  Himalaya  ramparts.  He  had 
not  only  subdued  the  countries  which  he  traversed,  but  had  es- 
tablished Greek  kingdoms,  the  survival  of  which  is  one  of  the 
neglected  seed-fields  of  history.  He  had  subjugated  Egypt,  as 
well  as  Syria  or  Persia,  and  had  planted  the  city  which,  becom- 
ing  a  chief  centre  of  population  and  commerce,  was  to  pei^petuate 
his  name  in  the  world.  According  to  Plutarch,  he  conceived 
himself  a  kind  of  Divine  umpire,  whose  mission  it  was  to  unite 
all  together,  forming  of  a  hundred  diverse  nations  a  common 
body,  mingling  as  in  a  cup  of  friendship  the  customs,  marriages, 
laws  of  all,  and  making  the  world  to  all  one  country.  Whether 
his  plans  were  so  far  impersonal, 'or  had  so  much  of  general 
philosophy,  may  reasonably  be  doubted.  But  the  fact  remains, 
that  he  vastly  surpassed  the  ambitious  enterprise  of  any  European 
who  had  preceded  him,  that  he  added  immensely  to  the  scantj 
knowledge  which  the  West  had  had  of  the  great  Eastern  world 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTION'S.  343 

and  that  lie  brought  India  face  to  face  with  that  part  of  the 
world  whose  impressions  on  her  subsequent  history  were  to  be 
60  important.  A  real  expansion  of  the  mind  of  mankind  is 
clearly  apparent,  after  his  brief  but  amazing  career.  All  dis- 
tances seemed  lessened.  All  obstacles  appeared  more  easy  to 
be  surmounted  by  a  daring  and  a  far-sighted  ambition. 

His  imposing  dominion  passed  away  with  his  life ;  but  this 
general  influence,  emanating  from  it,  was  not  intercepted,  and  the 
East  and  the  West  were  never  again  so  utterly  severed  as  they 
had  before  been.  And  now,  at  the  time  when  Christianity  was 
preached,  another  empire  had  come  to  its  development,  not  sud- 
denly, but  through  a  growth  which  knit  centuries  in  fellowship. 
It  touched  the  Euphrates  on  the  east,  upon  whose  banks  Alex- 
ander had  died,  and  it  went  thence  with  the  westering  sun  to 
the  Columns  of  Hercules,  to  Gaul,  and  to  Britain.  It  made  the 
Mediterranean  a  Koman  lake.  It  was  recognized  in  the  Ger- 
man forests,  on  the  banks  of  the  lower  Danube,  in  the  Libyan 
desert,  at  the  Cataracts  of  the  Nile.  It  compassed  the  Earth, 
as  this  was  then  known,  so  as  till  then  had  never  been  done.  The 
brass  of  its  helmets  glistened  beneath  the  Arabian  sun,  and  re- 
flected the  brief  winter-gleams  along  the  friths  of  Forth  and 
Clyde.  It  had  its  civil  and  judicial  representatives  in  all  prin- 
cipal cities ;  while  it  sent  out  its  avenues  of  travel  and  traffic, 
with  a  lordly  disregard  of  all  natural  obstacles,  over  mountain 
and  river,  from  the  milestone  of  gilded  marble  in  the  Forum, 
toward  the  ends  of  the  earth.  For  the  first  time  in  history  the 
assured  and  seemingly  permanent  ascendency  of  one  great  state 
gave  general  political  combination  to  mankind.  It  made  changes 
of  residence  easy  and  familiar,  and  made  frequent  passage  from 
one  land  to  another  practicable  and  safe  ;  and  it  gave  a  new  and 
vast  opportunity  for  the  wide  propagation  of  whatever  might  l>e 
the  spiritual  force  which  lay  in  the  religion  then  suddenly  ap- 
pearing in  the  world. 

Looked  at  in  the  light  of  its  subsequent  relations,  the  reticu- 
lated wires  which  now  cover  the  continent,  and  run  under  the 
€ea,  seem  no  more  directly  or  intelligently  related  to  the  passage 
of  the  thoughts  which  ride  upon  them  than  does  that  unequalled 
military,  legislative,  and  judicial  empire  to  the  spread  of  the 
story  which  the  Gospels  declare. 


34:4  ^  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

But  anotlier  force  also  was  present,  bearing  iipou  tlie  same 
effect,  as  if  arranged  with  reference  to  it:  the  intellectnal 
ascendency  now  conceded  to  the  conquered  but  culturing  state* 
of  Greece — whose  literature  was  studied,  and  whose  principal 
ideas,  conveyed  in  that  literature,  were  familiar  and  honored,  ia 
different  lands  ;  in  whose  language,  indeed,  the  early  native  his- 
torians of  Kome  had  by  preference  written,  by  whose  scholars 
the  antiquities  of  the  imperial  city  had  been  explored,  whose 
theatres  had  been  adopted  in  it,  and  whose  speech  was  current 
in  the  provinces  as  at  the  capital,  at  all  chief  places  throughout 
the  empire.  In  the  Eastern  departments  it  was  the  general 
language ;  and  its  prevalence  was  so  permanent  that  Justinian, 
afterward,  had  to  allow  the  Institutes,  the  Pandects,  and  the  Co- 
dex to  be  translated  into  Greek,  in  which  his  Novelise  were  for 
the  most  part  onginally  published.  A  general  vehicle  of  in* 
struction,  before  unpossessed,  was  thus  given  to  the  early  teachers 
of  Christianity,  by  this  wide  distribution  of  the  vital,  flexible^ 
spiritual  language,  which  seems  adapted  by  its  very  constitution 
not  only  to  charm  men  in  poetry,  or  stir  them  in  eloquence,  but 
to  present,  in  most  responsive  and  subtile  completeness,  the 
supreme  results  of  speculative  thought,  or  the  instructions  of 
Divine  inspiration. 

Yet  more,  even,  was  given,  of  advantage  and  facility  to  such 
teachers,  by  the  general  circulation  and  the  conceded  authority 
of  Greek  ideas.  The  religion  of  Jesus,  though  so  intrinsically 
separate  and  peculiar,  found  points  of  support  in  both  the  Pla- 
tonic and  the  Stoical  philosophies,  which  were  now  widely 
studied.  Stoicism,  in  its  stubborn  and  proud  self-assertion,  and 
its  pantheistic  conception  of  God,  was  removed  as  far  as  possi- 
ble from  the  Christian  doctrine  of  a  holy  and  loving  Father  in 
Heaven,  and  from  the  precept  of  penitent  humility.  Yet  by 
recognizing  so  far  as  it  did  the  unity  of  the  universe,  by  its 
practical  spirit,  and  certainly  by  some  of  its  ethical  maxims,  it 
accomplished  a  work  intellectual  at  least,  in  some  measure  moral, 
which  made  the  way  more  easy  for  the  Gospel.  Men  taught  by 
it,  occasionally  at  least,  reacted  from  it,  into  a  system  wider  and 
grander,  as  well  as  more  tender,  devout,  and  hopeful.  The 
Porch  was,  sometimes,  the  vestibule  of  the  Temple. 

PUtonis  n  had  wrouoht  in  the  same  direction,  still  more  ener- 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  345 

getically  :  by  suggesting  the  siiper-terrestrial  nature  of  the  soul 
in  man,  the  possibility  of  its  redemption  from  pollutions  of  mat> 
ter,  with  the  vast  elevation  of  which  the  intellect  was  capable, 
and  with  the  capacity  of  the  moral  nature,  in  the  best,  for  the 
attainment  of  a  Divine  justice.  If  he  did  not  himself,  as  he 
certainly  did  not,  see  what  or  all  which  was  afterward  found  in 
the  Christian  Faith,  Plato  helped  many  minds,  as  I  before  have 
suggested,  to  discover  and  to  welcome  the  glory  of  that.  Justin 
felt,  with  many  others,  a  true  obligation  to  him  who  from  the 
sacred  olives  of  the  Academy  had  been  his  unconscious  guide  to 
the  Master :  giving  the  perception  of  immaterial  things,  furnish- 
ing the  mind  almost  as  with  wings  for  the  high  contemplation 
of  celestial  ideas,  leading  it  to  expect  to  look  upon  God,  which 
is,  as  Justin  said,  'the  end  of  Plato's  philosophy.'  The  wait- 
ing attitude  of  the  great  philosopher,  expectant  of  light  not  yet 
in  the  world,  is  forcibly  expressed  in  the  words  which  I  quoted 
from  the  second  Alcibiades  in  a  previous  Lecture  :  that  we 
must  wait  for  some  god,  or  god-inspired  man,  to  show  the  true 
knowledge  of  our  duty  toward  God  to  our  purified  eyes.  The 
Platonic  authorship  of  that  is  not  certain,  though  defended  in 
our  time  by  Mr.  Grote  and  Mr.  Lewes.  But  the  same  feeling  ia 
expressed  in  the  Kepublic,  when  he  says :  '  Let  each  one  of  us 
leave  every  other  kind  of  knowledge,  and  seek  and  follow  one 
thing  only — if,  peradventure,  he  may  be  able  to  learn  and  find 
who  there  is  who  can  and  will  teach  him  to  distinguish  the  life 
of  good  and  evil,  and  to  choose  always  and  everywhere  the  bet- 
ter life,  as  far  as  possible';*  and  it  is  the  same  thought  Avhich 
he  attributes  to  Simmias  in  the  Phaedo,  where  he  represents 
him  as  saying  to  Socrates  that  one  finding  it  hard  to  attain  cer- 
tainty about  such  supreme  questions  should  still  'persevere  until 
he  has  attained  one  of  two  things :  either  he  should  discern  or 
learn  the  truth  about  them ;  or,  if  this  be  impossible,  I  would 
have  him  take  the  best  and  most  irrefragable  of  human  notions, 
and  let  this  be  the  raft  on  which  he  sails  through  life — not  with 
out  risk,  as  I  admit,  if  he  cannot  find  some  word  of  God 
which  will  more  surely  and  safely  carry  him.'  f 


*  Republic  :  X.:  618.  t  Phaedo :  85. 


346  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

To  the  ininds  which,  by  the  great  Atheiiiaji,  had  been  led  tc 
this  attitude  of  desire  if  not  hope  for  something  better  than  he 
could  gi^e,  the  new  religion  came  as  the  word  for  which  he 
had  longed,  and  of  which  he  seemed  to  have  had  premonition. 
The  same  processes  of  mind  which  afterward  appeared  so  sig- 
nally in  Augustine,  were  not  unknown  in  an  earlier  time. 

Eut  while  there  was  such  a  remarkable  preparation  in  these 
directions  for  the  rapid  communication  of  the  new,  strange,  and 
surpassing  religion  to  the  knowledge  of  mankind — a  preparation 
which,  in  both  its  nature  and  its  extent,  appears  to  outreach 
human  sagacity,  and  wholly  to  transcend  mortal  contrivance — 
there  is  still  a  third  element  to  be  brought  into  view,  to  make  our 
conception  of  this  complete :  that  is,  the  strange  dispersion  of  the 
Jews,  the  Diaspora  so  called,  which  had  been  proceeding  from 
the  time  of  the  return  from  the  Eastern  captivity.  The  strict 
ancient  localization  of  the  Hebrew  people,  upon  the  narrow 
tongue  of  land  which  had  been  early  assigned  to  their  Fathers — 
this,  which  up  to  the  time  of  their  captivity  had  been  even  rigor- 
ous, after  their  return  gave  way,  you  remember,  to  other  influ- 
ences ;  and  now  they  were  in  all  parts  of  the  empire.  The 
former  stationary  agriculturists  or  shepherds  had  come  to  be 
traders,  mechanics,  what  we  might  call  travelling-agents,  to  an 
extraordinary  extent.  Josephus  speaks  of  them  as  widely  carry- 
ing on  their  mechanical  trades,  throughout  the  empire.  Their 
strange  faces  and  stranger  speech  had  become  familiar  in  all  the 
principal  cities.  In  Alexandria,  they  were  gathered  in  such  vast 
numbers  as  to  occupy  two  of  five  sections  of  the  city,  and  to 
have  for  governor  an  ethnarch  of  their  own.  In  Babylon,  and 
the  Eastern  cities,  great  multitudes  remained.  In  Rome,  eight 
thousand  of  those  resident  there,  it  is  said  by  Josephus,  went  on 
one  occasion  to  Augustus,  accompanying  ambassadors  sent  by 
the  Jews  of  Palestine  to  the  Emperor  against  Archelaus.*  At 
Antioch,  Ephesus,  Corinth,  Cyrene,  in  Italy  and  Sicily,  at  Mar- 
seilles, in  Spain,  they  were  everywhere  found.  It  has  even  been 
suggested  that  Seneca  himself,  of  a  Spanish  family,  may  have 
had  Semitic  blood  in  his  veins,  as  his  name  was  afterward  borne 


"Antiquities":  XVII.:  xi.:  i. 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  347 

by  &  Jew.  This  is  not  probable.  But  certainly  the  Jews  were 
80  widely  scattered  throughout  the  empire  that  laws  and  cus- 
toms, even  in  the  capital,  were  more  or  less  adjusted  to  theii 
usage,  as  concerning  the  Sabbath,  for  example;  and  that  the 
common  thought  of  the  time  took  from  them  a  distinct  impres- 
sion, if  not  a  decisive  and  governing  trend. 

Wherever  they  went,  the  synagogue  went  with  them,  the  an- 
cient scriptures,  and  their  beloved  ministries  of  worship.  Their 
idiosyncrasy  was  as  perfectly  maintained  as  if  they  had  been 
dwelling  at  Bethlehem  or  at  Hebron.  Science  applies  the  word 
^*  diaspora,"  with  a  curious  parallelism,  to  a  certain  mineral,  of 
thin  scales,  with  hard,  small,  prismatic  crystals,  which  is  wholly 
infusible,  but  which  crackles  and  explodes  at  the  touch  of  the 
blow-pipe.  A  more  perfect  image  of  the  dispersed  Jewish 
people  in  the  day  of  the  Lord  could  hardly  be  supplied  by  na- 
ture. And  they  formed,  of  course,  the  first  point  of  contact  in  all 
the  efforts  of  Christian  teachers  to  extend  their  religion :  many 
of  them  becoming,  as  we  know,  in  spite  of  all  prejudice,  and  in 
face  of  all  passions  excited  against  them,  among  the  earliest  and 
most  fervent  of  its  converts. 

Looking,  then,  at  the  time  when  this  religion  whose  effects 
we  have  been  tracing  emerged  into  history,  and  entered  on  its 
conquering  career  in  the  world,  we  may  certainly  say  that  while 
it  came  suddenly,  without  human  expectation,  not  as  developed 
out  of  anything  else,  but  as  breaking  abruptly  into  the  conti- 
nuity of  historical  successions,  it  came  also,  in  the  most  distinct 
and  imperative  sense,  in  '  the  fullness  of  time ';  when  opportu- 
nities were  before  it  which  in  earlier  centuries  had  been  quite 
inconceivable;  when  agencies  and  instruments  were  prepared 
for  its  furtherance  which  had  been  as  unthought-of  in  the  day 
of  the  prophets  as  were  modern  steam-engines ;  when,  from  its 
remote  pulpit  in  Palestine,  it  could  be  sounded  throughout 
the  world  as  at  no  time  before  since  the  first  dispersion  of  the 
children  of  men.  As  a  human  speculation,  this  could  not  have 
lijlped  it.  It  must  have  been  shattered  only  more  utterly  and 
swiftly  in  the  sudden  collision  with  the  rites  and  rules  of  diverse 
nations.  As  a  Divine  system,  prepared  for  the  world,  it  had 
now  its  immense  opportunity.   And  if  this  unparalleled  cosmica 


348  ^  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

arrangement  for  its  propagation  was  a  matter  of  accident,  it  is 
the  most  surprising  accident  in  the  records  of  Time.  To  one 
who  finds  a  moral  order  in  the  history  of  the  world,  this  looks 
as  methodical,  and  as  surelj  designed,  as  is  the  relation  of  levers 
and  wheels  to  the  boiler  whose  water  is  turned  to  power  when 
fire  smites  it.  He  as  naturally  thinks  of  Napoleon's  great  Italian 
campaigns  as  accidental,  or  of  the  formation  of  Justinian's  Code. 
But  if  it  was  designed,  and  not  fortuitous,  can  any  conceive  that 
the  immense  intelligent  plan  here  represented  was  the  plan  even 
of  philosophers  or  of  statesmen  ?  much  more,  of  an  untaught 
peasant  of  E'azareth?  that  it  was  the  plan  of  any  other  than  of 
Him  who  sitteth  on  the  circle  of  the  heavens,  and  whose  vast 
designs  march  on  like  suns  i  And  if  it  was  His  sovereign  plan 
for  this  religion,  then  the  estimate  put  on  it  by  Him  is  demon- 
strated :  the  nearness  of  it  to  His  Divine  mind  could  not  be 
more  evident  if  it  were  written  in  characters  of  light  upon  the 
glowing  Judean  sky.  • 

The  new  religion  which  entered  so  silently  into  history, 
although  with  such  apparently  intentional  adjustments  for  its 
rapid  publication,  worked  on  as  a  hidden  force  at  first,  as  is  the 
method  with  all  God's  seeds,  even  those  which  are  afterward  to 
spring  up  majestically,  in  oaks  or  palms,  or  in  cedars  of  Lebanon'. 
After  the  end  of  the  first  Christian  century,  it  was  still,  to  thought- 
ful and  cultivated  Eomans,  a  mere  foreign  superstition :  which 
Tacitus  characterized  as  ^  destructive ';  *  which  Suetonius  called 
'  new  and  noxious ';  f  which  Pliny  the  Younger  emphatically 
described  as  *  perverse  and  extravagant.'  X  But  it  wrought  with 
an  energy  inherent  in  itself  in  the  midst  of  the  society  whose 
foremost  representatives  so  detested  or  disdained  it.  It  wrought 
with  the  same  persistency  afterward,  through  ever-widening  cir- 
cles of  influence,  in  the  vaster,  wider,  and  more  barbarous  popular 
tions  to  whom  it  was  carried  while  the  empire  was  falling,  or 
after  that  w^hich  had  seemed  the  strongest  institution  of  man 
had  gone  down  beneath  destroying  assault.     It  has  continued 


*  "Exitiabilis  snperstitio  " :  Annal.,  xv. :  44. 
t "  Novae  ac  maleficae  "  :  Nero :  xvi. 
\  "  Pravam  et  immodicam  "  :  Ep.  X.  :  97. 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  349 

thus  to  work,  as  I  think  I  have  shown,  from  that  day  to  this ; 
and  its  power  surrounds  us,  on  every  hand. 

It  has  not  had  a  uniform  development.  It  has  not  always 
been  exhibited  through  equivalent  forms  of  thought.  Some- 
times in  one  way,  sometimes  in  another,  it  has  been  presented, 
because  diversely  understood.  At  one  period  certain  elements  in 
it  have  taken  what  we  may  think  an  exaggerated  prominence  in 
the  conception  of  its  disciples ;  at  other  periods,  different  elementa 
and  forces  in  its  manifold  scheme  have  been  similarly,  perhaps 
unduly,  exalted.  And  sometimes,  no  doubt,  as  regarded  from 
our  particular  point  of  interpreting  study,  the  whole  has  appeared 
overlaid  and  concealed  beneath  fantastic  or  pernicious  additions,  oJf 
human  device.  But  the  astonishing  vitality  of  the  religion  has 
been  shown,  perhaps  as  clearly  as  in  anything,  in  the  fact  that 
when  most  distorted  and  disguised  it  has  still  been  more  power- 
ful to  work  good  among  men  than  paganism  was  in  its  clearest 
exposition  ;  that  the  very  fragments  and  filaments  of  it  have  had 
in  them  a  healing  virtue,  like  that  which  was  said  to  have  issued 
on  occasion  from  the  hem  of  the  robe  of  him  who  brought  it. 
It  has  shown,  too,  the  most  extraordinary  power  of  releasing  itself 
from  human  misconception,  of  revealing  itself  afresh  to  men  in 
its  primitive  energy,  and  of  rectifying  whatever  in  doctrine  or 
institution  had  dangerously  departed  from  the  earliest  norm.  It 
has  plainly  and  strangely  exhibited  a  capacity  for  self-resurrec- 
tion, like  that  which  the  early  disciples  ascribed  to  its  Teacher, 
— their  faith  in  which  sceptics  admit  as  indispensable  to  explain 
their  amazing  subsequent  history :  and  of  the  religion  it  has 
certainly  been  true  that  no  sopulchre-doors  have  been  able  to 
hold  it.  It  has  fallen  in  no  combat  to  which  it  has  been  called. 
It  has  been  proved  inadequate  to  no  work  presented.  The  most 
prolonged  and  passionate  assaults  of  its  ablest  antagonists  have 
failed  to  dislodge  it  from  the  minds  or  the  communities  which 
have  tried  it  most  thoroughly.  Its  influence  appears  as  plainly 
to-day,  on  every  side,  as  it  ever  has  done  in  any  time  since  it 
first  was  proclaimed.  The  eagle  of  the  Faith  is  not  yet '  weary  oi 
its  mighty  wings.' 

Whatever  may  be  our  just  criticism  of  modern  society — or 
wliatever,  on  the  other  hand,  may  be  our  confidence  in  ethics, 


350  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

legislations,  improved  industries,  widened  commerce,  tlie  general 
distribution  of  letters  and  knowledge — it  seems  almost  impos- 
Bible  to  doubt  that  tlie  religion  of  Jesus  is  at  this  hour  the  com- 
manding factor  in  whatever  is  best  in  the  character  and  the  prog- 
ress of  persons  or  of  states.     It  has  not  merely  rectified  particu- 
lar abuses,  removed  special  evils,  exerted  a  benign  and  sahitary 
influence  on  local  institutions.     It  has  formed  and  instructed  a 
general  Christian  consciousness  in  the  world,  which  is  practically 
ubiquitous  and  commanding  in  Christendom :  to  which  institu- 
tions, tendencies,  persons,  are  more  and  more  distinctly  amenable ; 
which  judges  all  by  an  ideal  standard ;  to  which  flattering  con- 
cessions to  wealth  or  power,  to  genius  or  culture,  are  inherently 
offensive  ;  which  constitutes  a  spiritual  bond  of  communion  be- 
tween the  most  widely  separated  states ;  and  which  affirms,  with 
sure  expectation,  its  own  approaching  supremacy  in  the  world. 
Nothing  at  all  approximating  this,  or  distantly  predicting  it,  was 
known  in  antiquity.     Nothing  like'it  is  known  on  earth  to-day, 
outside  the  range  of  this  religion.     Yet  this  unseen  and  regulat- 
ing power,  born  of  the  spread  of  Christianity  in  the  world,  is  to 
thoughtful  observers  the  fact  of  chiefest  significance  and  import- 
ance in  the  present  developing  life  of  mankind. 

Men  say  sometimes  that  the  argument  from  Miracles  is  not 
now  so  impressive  as  it  was  at  the  outset,  to  those  who  saw,  or 
thought  they  saw,  the  dead  raised  to  life,  and  the  liquid  wave 
supporting  the  form  which  trode  in  silent  supremacy  upon  it. 
That  is  not  a  question  for  me  to  discuss.  But  certiiinly  the  argu- 
ment from  these  recorded  effects  of  Christianity  was  never  so 
prominent  or  so  energetic  as  it  is  at  this  hour.  Whether  we  will 
or  no,  'the  standing  miracle  of  Christendom'  is  around  us;  and 
the  religion  to  which  that  must  be  ascribed  has  a  prestige  from 
it  which  it  could  not  have  had  in  the  day  of  the  martyrs,  in  the 
Middle  Age,  or  at  the  Keformation.  I  look  back  on  its  course, 
I  look  up  to  Him  who  personally  brought  it,  and  who  undertook 
by  it  from  Capernaum  and  from  Bethany  to  renovate  the  world, 
I  look  upon  the  peoples  who  have  not  had  it,  and  whose  history 
everywhere  shows  its  absence — and  then  I  ask  myself,  not  now 
as  a  Christian,  but  as  a  student  of  the  past,  as  one  impelled  by  a 
native  and  governing  law  of  the  mind  to  trace  effects  to  ade 


WITH  ADDED  SUQGESTI02^S.  S6\ 

quate  causes :  *  Is  it  possible  that  that  young  man  of  Nazareth 
had  only  a  genius  like  that  of  others  to  inspire  and  empower 
him  ?  that  only  the  natural  human  elements,  of  speculative  thought 
and  of  ethical  precept,  with  the  incidents  of  a  life  obscure  and 
brief,  closed  on  the  cross,  have  been  the  forces  which  have  shaped, 
vitalized,  and  set  forward  Christendom  ? '  I  have  no  right  to 
anticipate  your  judgment;  but  to  me  this  seems  ai  strange  a 
fantasy  as  ever  possessed  a  human  brain  ! 

You  observe,  too,  that  this  argument  must  naturally  be 
strengthened  as  centuries  pass.  Other  religions  are  local  still, 
as  they  were  in  antiquity :  reflecting  the  thought  of  special  na- 
tionalities ;  moulding  the  life  of  particular  districts.  This,  alone, 
is  universal :  adapted  to  every  country  and  people,  as  the  atmos- 
phere  is,  or  as  radiant  light.  Other  religions  have  passed  to  the 
state  of  retrogression.  They  are  more  and  more  timid  before  Chris- 
tianity. The  peoples  trained  under  them  see  all  the  time  the  more 
energetic  inspirational  force,  mental  and  spiritual,  exerted  by 
this,  the  richer  blessings  which  it  scatters  on  its  path ;  and  the 
voices  which  were  said  to  be  heard  of  old  in  the  Temple  on 
Moriah,  before  it  fell  under  Eoman  assault,  saying  solemnly 
*  Let  us  remove  hence,'*  are  now  repeated  in  all  the  famous 
idol-shrines.  Christianity  alone  is  still  young  as  the  morning, 
full  of  an  unwasted  power,  exuberant  yet  with  strong  expecta- 
tion. Its  power  to  impenetrate  everything  human,  by  first  im- 
buing the  soul  of  man,  continues  what  it  was.  Its  facilities  for 
extension  were  never  so  great  as  at  this  moment :  the  motive  to 
that  extension  never  was  greater.  If  then  there  be  any  truth 
whatever — and  there  seems  to  be  much — in  the  instruction  of 
physical  science  that  '  the  fittest  shall  survive,'  and  if  the  rule  be 
admitted  to  hold  in  the  higher  realms  of  moral  experience. 
Science  herself  may  make  us  certain  that  this  religion,  which 
has  shown  itself  fitted  for  all  the  effects  which  I  have  sketched — 
making  civilization,  as  Farrar  has  said,  '  only  a  secular  phrase  for 
Christianity  'f — that  this  shall  be  the  one  to  outlive  others  ;  to 
conquer  and  accomplish,  where  they  have  failed ;  to  make  ita 


*  Josephus :  "  Wars  of  Jews,"  VI. :  v. :  3. 

t  "  Witness  of  History  to  Christ  ":  London  ed.,  1872 :  p.  193. 


352  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

past  achievements  in  the  world  the  imperfect  signs  of  what  yet 
is  to  come  ;  and  to  see  the  globe  the  final  domain  of  its  perennial 
and  renovating  life. 

If  this  religion  is  not  Divine,  in  the  transcendent  sense,  then 
assuredly  no  other  is.  And  as  long  as  man's  religious  nature,  in 
the  chiefest  crises  of  his  experience,  cries  out  for  a  Faith  on 
which  he  may,  with  gladdened  heart  and  unfaltering  step,  ascend 
to  God — this,  which  is  so  simple  yet  so  commanding,  so  delicate 
but  so  vast,  so  apt  for  the  poor,  so  robed  and  crowned  with 
magnificent  victories,  will  still  attract  his  adoring  reverence,  and 
his  passionate  love ! 

Ladies,  and  Gentlemen :  you  have  studied,  I  know,  will  study 
hereafter,  with  candid  fidelity,  this  august  and  superlative  relig- 
ion. You  will  not  be  surprised,  I  am  sure,  if,  coming  to  it  along 
the  eminent  track  of  thought  which  we  have  followed,  you  find 
elements  associated  in  it  unique  and  incomparable,  surpassing 
parallels,  surpassing  perhaps  your  own  pre-conception.  It  is 
only  fair  to  anticipate  such.  It  cannot  be  anything  slight  or 
commonplace  which  has  wrought  such  prodigious  effects  in 
history.  Men  do  not  fracture  bars  of  iron  by  heaping  fragrant 
rosebuds  upon  them,  in  dainty  festoons.  They  do  not  cleave  the 
mountain-clifis  with  drills  of  delicate  opaline  glass.  There  must 
be  always  a  certain  proportion  between  instrument  and  effect; 
and  it  is  not  possible  that  a  scheme  of  careful  prudential  morals, 
persuasive  sentiments,  entertaining  instruction,  agreeable  prom- 
ise of  good  to  virtue,  should  have  wrought  the  changes  which 
we  have  reviewed.  There  were  plenty  of  such  in  the  old  phi- 
losophies; beautiful,  often,  as  tinted  leaves  on  autumn  forests, 
and  as  powerless  as  these  to  arrest  the  rushing  and  turbid  cur- 
rents of  social  life  over  which  they  brightened,  or  upon  which 
they  dropped.  There  nmst  be  something  surpassing  these,  in 
this  religion,  to  make  it  robust,  practical,  inspiring,  as  it  certain- 
ly has  been ;  adequate  to  enduring  and  extensive  effects ;  a  fit 
instrument  for  Him  to  use  who  presides  over  nations  and  their 
progress. 

For  myself  I  say,  with  utter  frankness,  that  I  look  for  things 
in  this  religion  as  singular  and  transcendent  as  its  career  in  his- 
tory  has  been.     The  fatherhood  of  God,  and  the  brotherhood  oi 


WITH  ADDED  l^UQQE&TIONS.  35a 

men,  are  palpable  in  it.  The  sw'ftest  reader  of  its  seriptiires^ 
cannot  miss  these.  But  more  than  these  it  seems  natural  to  an- 
ticipate in  a  system  which  has  grappled  the  mind  of  the  world 
with  a  hold  so  firm  and  unrelaxing,  and  which  has  so  largely  re- 
moulded its  life.  It  seems  to  me  only  natural  to  expect  a  Law 
at  its  centre — not  simple  ethical  instruction  or  advice,  but — a 
Law,  moral  in  nature  and  of  spiritual  authority,  yet  as  definite 
and  imperative  as  that  which  holds  together  the  earth,  and  keep& 
it  in  place  among  the  planets.  It  may  be  spoken  through  hu- 
man lips.  It  may  be  uttered  in  words  as  tender  as  those  with 
which  lover  woos  his  bride.  But  I  look  beforehand  for  a  Divine 
Rule  of  i-ighteousness,  as  clear  as  the  light,  as  wide  in  its  sweep 
as  the  spheres  and  systems  of  intelligent  life,  which  has  behind 
it  the  unfailing  supremacy  of  the  Infinite  Will,  and  Avhich  faces 
the  passionate  spirit  in  man  with  imperial  sanctions.  I  anticipate 
some  stupendous  ministry  in  this  system  of  Faith  to  that  craving 
for  Sacrifice,  as  the  gateway  to  God,  on  which  the  ethnic  rites 
were  based,  and  through  which  they  held  the  hearts  of  peoples. 
I  expect,  for  myself,  a  supernatural  Person,  the  illustrious 
Teacher  of  this  religion:  veiling  His  glory,  perhaps,  for  our 
eyes,  behind  flesh  and  nerve,  in  a  strict  and  singular  humbleness 
of  mien,  but  in  Himself  above  Socrates  or  Plato,  Gautama  or 
Seneca,  above  Moses,  Isaiah,  or  any  prophet — an  immortal  Lord 
of  life  and  of  light,  whose  touch  gives  impulse  to  remote  genera- 
tions, whose  words  have  eternal  freshness  in  them,  in  devotion  to 
whom  is  the  triumph  of  the  heart.  I  expect  a  peculiar  Divine 
Life,  to  attend  this  religion — preparing  before  it  human  spints, 
overcoming  the  passion  and  pride  which  resist  it,  and  giving  it 
that  marvellous  range  of  power  which  has  been  palpably  its  in- 
heritance. Not  doctrine  only,  however  majestic,  not  precept  only, 
however  commanding,  riot  example  only,  though  having  upon  it 
the  beauty  of  the  heavens,  are  to  be  looked  for  in  this  world- 
compelling  and  astonishing  system:  but  with  them  all,  the 
source  of  their  efficacy,  a  mystic  and  boundless  energy  of  Life, 
which  penetrates  souls,  subdues  resistances,  inspires  benign  and 
unquenchable  enthusiasms,  and  knits  together  the  minds  which 
it  fills  in  a  supreme  fellowship  of  peace  and  of  power.  It  is  fair  to 
look  for  an  element  of  this  kind,  which  other  systems  always 
23 


854  A  REVIEW  OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

have  lacked,  wlieii  we  put  the  novel  effects  of  this  in  contrast  with 
whatever  they  have  accomplished.  And  it  is  equally  natural  to  ex. 
pect  that  Eternity  by  it  will  be  plainly  foreshadowed  to  human 
eyes,  with  glooms  and  glories  surpassing  thought,  to  stir  desire 
and  startle  fear ; — and  to  look  for  societies  among  its  disciples,  as 
permanent  as  itself,  pervaded  by  the  Life  which  continually  at- 
tends it,  and  so  intimate  and  vital  as  no  philosophy  had  ever 
conceived.  I  anticipate,  for  myself,  a  tone  of  Authority  in  it  all : 
which  affirms  without  argument,  announces  truths  without  wait- 
ing to  debate  them,  and  asserts  the  Future,  unseen  by  man,  as 
real  as  the  globe  on  which  he  treads. 

Unless  I  tind  such  sovereign  elements  combined  and  regnant 
in  this  religion,  it  will  scarcely  be  possible  to  interpret  its  tran- 
Bcendent  and  un wasting  power.  But  if  I  find  them,  even  its  un- 
equalled career  in  the  world  will  be  to  me  no  more  unaccountable 
than  the  rush  of  the  river  from  the  heights  to  the  sea,  or  the  fiery 
eigzag  blazing  above  when  electric  currents  cleave  the  air. 

And  if  such  amazing  elements  are  found  in  the  vital  substance 
of  this  religion,  then  anything  else  of  miracle  and  wonder  asso- 
ciated with  it  at  ite  first  proclamation  becomes  to  me — not  diffi- 
cult of  belief  ? — becomes  probable  beforehand :  a  natural  mark 
of  God's  interest  in  it;  a  natural  impulse,  given  by  Him,  to 
launch  it  into  historical  development.  If  one  could  walk  along 
some  luminous  bridge  of  star-beams,  up  to  the  orb  in  which 
the  strange  effluence  had  its  source,  he  could  not  be  sui'prised 
to  find  there,  at  last,  the  original  effulgence  in  an  unwasting 
splendor.  If  one  walks  along  the  path,  over  many  lands, 
through  darkened  centuries,  which  Chi'istianity  has  brightened 
with  glowing  lights,  and  on  which  she  has  strewn  astonishing 
victones,  he  can  hardly  be  amazed  when  he  finds  at  the  outset 
the  deaf  hearing,  the  blind  seeing,  the  dumb  made  to  speak, 
and  the  poor  hearing  the  word  of  life.  It  will  be  to  him  har- 
monious as  music,  though  loftier  than  the  chiming  suns,  to  see 
the  Lord  of  this  religion  arising  from  the  grave,  and  ascending 
in  illustrious  triumph  to  Heaven ! 

All  miracles  of  power,  or  shining  theophanies,  will  appear 
but  as  idioms  of  Divine  utterance,  when  once  we  recognize  God 
Himself  in  this  religion.     They  wiU  be  the  appropriate  though 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  355 

the  emphatic  motions  of  His  might  who  was  here  intervening  to 
biuAi  a  new  moral  creation,  of  loveliness  and  of  holiness,  on  the 
chaos  of  the  old.  The  absence  of  Miracle  would  then  become 
the  thing  mysterious. 

But  whatever  we  find,  or  fail  to  find,  in  this  religion,  of  that 
which  surpasses  historical  precedent,  of  that  which  staggers 
human  thought,  let  us  always  remember,  what  I  said  at  the 
outset,  that  the  only  final  and  absolute  test  must  be  in  our  own 
experience  of  it.  No  matter  what  its  history  has  been  :  no 
matter  what  its  contents  may  be :  the  governing  question  still 
remains,  '  Does  it  bring  me  to  God  ?  In  belief  of  its  teaching, 
in  obedience  to  its  law,  through  trust  in  its  promises,  through 
confiding  and  affectionate  faith  in  its  King,  do  I  find  a  new 
courage  amid  danger,  a  new  fortitude  in  adversity,  a  new  suprem- 
acy over  subtlest  temptations,  a  happiness  in  hope  before  un- 
known, a  delight  in  consecration  surpassing  all  preceding  pleas- 
ure, an  intense  and  tender  sympathy  with  Him  before  whose  holi- 
ness the  seraphim  bow  V  If  we  do  find  these  supernal  effects 
wrought  by  Christianity  in  our  life,  no  further  argument  for  us 
will  be  needful.  "Whatever  arguments  shall  have  led  us  to  that, 
will  be  to  us  unspeakably  precious.  Conspiring  probabilities  will 
then  have  merged  in  our  assurance,  as  blue  and  orange  and  crimson 
are  blended  in  the  beauty  of  sunlight.  They  will  have  rushed 
inseparably  together,  like  different  rills  mingling  in  a  current 
of  irresistible  conviction.  Then  we  shall  not  so  much  accept 
this  religion  as  be  possessed  by  it,  with  a  fullness  of  strength 
in  its  unmeasured  grasp  which  age  cannot  waste,  nor  trouble 
break,  nor  death  itself  shatter  or  smite.  We  shall  no  more 
be  afraid,  after  that,  of  the  furious  assaults  which  a  passion- 
ate unbelief  may  make  on  this  religion,  than  we  shall  be 
afraid  lest  the  blast  of  the  miner  in  western  hills  should  shake 
the  stars  from  their  serene  poise.  It  will  stir  again  the  old 
enthusiasm  in  our  timid  or  languid  and  sluggish  spirits.  ]t 
will  open  afresh  before  our  eyes  the  vast  meanings  of  life.  Ser- 
vice for  it  will  become  to  us  a  joy.  We  shall  feel  and  know 
that  in  such  service  we  are  grandly  allied  with  the  Lord  of  our 
faith,  and  with  Him  whom  that  Lord  declares  to  us.  We  shall 
see  the  secret  of  the  unseen  indefinable  power  which  belongs  to 


^56  A   REVIEW   OF  THE  ARGUMENT, 

devoted  Chnstian  work;  that  spiritual  assistances,  the  invisib.e 
energy  of  a  benign  Providence,  help  it  forward ;  and  that  fur- 
ther than  thought  itself  can  anticipate,  the  far  vibrations  of  its 
energy  shall  reach.  In  the  ilkiminecl  Future  of  the  World  we 
shall  feel  that  we  also,  with  apostles  and  martyrs,  through  our 
devotion  to  this  religion,  have  a  personal  pai-t. 

Yea,  more  than  this  will  then  appear :  that  by  the  religion 
which  thus  brings  us  to  God,  we  have  the  assurance  of  spheres 
i»f  life  beyond  the  present,  whose  glories  as  yet  we  cannot  meas- 
ui'e.  It  cannot  be  for  less  than  such  a  transcendent  effect  that 
this  religion  has  come,  if  it  has,  from  realms  above  our  mortal 
eight !  It  cannot  be  for  less  than  that,  that  such  unspeakable 
powers  are  in  it!  The  same  supreme  Person  who  has  made  his 
word  the  soul  of  History,  who  has  been,  as  he  claimed  to  be, 
"  the  Light  of  the  World,"  declared  that  in  the  Father's  house 
are  many  mansions,  and  that  they  who  have  followed  him  here 
in  spirit  shall  there  at  length  behold  his  face,  partake  his  glory. 
On  a  low  hill,  outside  the  gates,  he  painfully  died.  But  even 
then  he  spoke  of  himself  as  standing  on  the  edge  of  Paradise. 
They  who  fled  thence,  in  impetuous  fear,  believed,  at  least,  that 
after  death  he  reappeared,  until  the  opened  heavens  received 
him.  The  light  which  later  shone  on  Paul,  from  a  splendor 
which  he  ascribed  to  the  Loi-d,  has  cast  its  gleam  on  many  lands. 
And  one  who  saw  him  later  still — or  thought  he  saw  him — 
amid  the  beauty  of  the  city  of  God,  said  that  on  his  head  were 
many  crowns.  All  that  will  seem  but  natural  to  us,  if  we  ac- 
cept  him  as  Son  of  God,  and  King  of  the  world.  Then  history 
itself  will  bear  its  witness  that  from  that  head  no  crown  has 
fallen  !  We  shall  know  from  the  manifold  progress  of  the  world, 
where  He  h:«%  touched  it,  that  the  face  which  then  shone  as  the 
Bun  has  kept  its  vivid  celestial  brightness;  that  the  voice  which 
said  to  John  *'  Fear  not,"  is  at  this  hour  as  sweet  and  royal ! 

It  seems  to  me  to  glorify  life,  it  seems  to  me  to  banish  the 
shadow  of  gloom  from  death,  to  feel  that  that  majestic  figure— 
of  Brother,  Teacher,  Friend,  Kedeemer — which  towers  supremely 
over  the  centuries,  which  made  the  earth  sublime  by  its  ad- 
vent, which  seemed  in  ascending  to  unite  it  to  the  heavena 
has  equal  place  in  worlds  to  come !  that  we  may  trust  His  im- 


WITH  ADDED  SUGGESTIONS.  357 

perative  word  ;  that  we  may  serve  His  kingly  cause  ;  that  we 
may  see  the  illumined  Universe,  for  us  as  for  Him,  a  house 
of  Victory  and  of  Peace  !  that  we  may  stand,  by  and  by,  with 
Hira,  amid  the  light  as  yet  unreached,  and  say,  each  one :  *  I 
believed  in  Thy  religion  I  I  saw  its  triumphs  in  the  earth  ;  I  felt 
its  power  in  my  heart ;  I  rose  to  God  in  love  upon  it ;  I  fore- 
knew by  it,  what  now  I  find — ^Eternal  Life ! ' 

Then  all  these  wonders  of  the  Past,  which  we  have  traced, 
shall  lose  themselves  in  vaster  wonders  still  to  come :  and  saint 
and  seer  shall  be  our  fellows,  in  that  immortal  Consummation  1 


APPENDIX. 


APPENDIX. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  I. 

Note  I. :  page  3. — *' Another  point  may  be  mentioned,  as  to  ^hicb 
'there  has  come  to  be  a  general  agreement:  namely,  that  the  very  lata 
date  assigned  to  the  [Fourth]  Gospel  by  Baur  and  Schwegler,  some- 
where between  the  years  160  and  170  a.d.,  cannot  be  maintained. 
Zeller  and  Scholten  retreat  to  150  ;  Hilgenfeld,  who  is  at  last  con- 
strained to  admit  its  use  by  Justin  Martyr,  goes  back  to  between  13C 
and  140  ;  Eenan  now  says  125  or  130  ;  Keim  in  the  first  volume  of  hia 
History  of  Jesus  of  Nazara  placed  it  with  great  confidence  between 
the  years  110  and  115,  or,  more  loosely,  a.d.  100-117.  The  fatal  conse- 
quences [to  his  own  theory  of  the  book]  of  such  an  admission  as  that 
were,  however,  soon  perceived ;  and  in  the  last  volume  of  his  History 
of  Jesus,  and  in  the  last  abridgment  of  that  work,  he  goes  back  to  the 
year  130.  Schenkel  assigns  it  to  a.d.  115-120."— [Dr.  Ezra  Abbott: 
"Authorship  of  the  Fourth  Gospel":  Boston  ed.,  1880:  pp.  11,  12. 

' '  The  criticism  which  David  Friedrich  Strauss  brought  to  bear  on 
the  gospel  history  in  his  '  Life  of  Jesus,'  1835,  grew  to  be  a  criticism  of 
the  gospel  books.  After  a  temporary  wavering,  1838,  it  turned  espec- 
ially to  John's  gospel,  1840.  After  the  headlong  attacks  of  Bruno 
Bauer,  1840  and  later,  F.  C  Baur,  in  Tiibingen,  opened  with  his  arti- 
cle on  composition  of  the  canonical  gospels,  in  the  Theologische  Jahr- 
biicher,  1844,  the  regular  attack  upon  the  Johannean  authoi-ship  and 
•the  historical  character  of  this  gospel.  .  .  It  drew  its  material  [accord- 
ing to  Baur]  from  the  synoptists,  but  shaped  this  according  to  its  aims, 
'  forth  from  the  Christian  consciousness,'  and  with  strictest  consistency 
made  the  history  subservient  to  the  idea.  Its  origin  cannot  be  put 
earlier  than  160  a.d.  Schwegler,  Kostlin,  Zeller,  and  others,  tried  to 
.  justify  this  view  in  different  books  and  articles ;  Zeller,  especially  in 
i*egard  to  the  testimony  of  the  ancient  church,  wrote  in  1845  and  1847. 
.  .  In  1849  and  later,  Hilgenfeld  went  further  than  Baur,  and  put  the 
gospel  between  Valentinus'  Gnosticism  and  Marcion's,  findmg  Gnostic 
•dualism  in  the  gospel  itseK.  But  a  series  of  investigations  in  the  con* 
vtrary  direction,  which  proved  the  use  of  the  gospel  especially  by  Justin 

^861) 


3f;2  APPENDIX. 

Martyr  and  the  Gnostics  of  the  second  century,  compelled  criticism  t<r 
withdraw  the  origin  of  the  gospel  to  an  earlier  date.  Hilgenfeld  went 
back  to  135  A.D.,  and  Keim  to  110-115."— [Luthardt :  "St.  John's 
Gospel";  Edinburgh  ed.,  Vol.  1:  pp.  213,  214. 

"We  need  not  then  be  surprised  that  in  the  end  Baur  alone  has  re- 
mained faithful  to  the  position  which  he  had  chosen,  and  that  the 
whole  school  has  begun  to  beat  a  retreat,  in  order  to  seek  another 
which  it  is  easier  to  defend.  .  .  If  all  the  writei'S  of  the  second  century, 
from  Ignatius  to  Justin,  and  from  Justin  to  Athenagoras,  lived  and 
wrote  prostrate  at  the  feet  of  the  Word  made  flesh,  it  is  because  the 
words  of  an  Apostle  were  there,  unceasingly  delivering  over  that  theme 
which  is  unfathomable  to  the  hearts  of  believers  to  the  meditation  of 
thoughtful  minds."— [Godet:  "  Comm.  on  Gospel  of  St.  John  " :  Edin 
burgh  ed.,  1876:  Vol.  1:  pp.  208,  245. 

II. :  p.  3.— "A  religion,  that  is,  a  true  religion,  must  consist  of  ideas- 
and  facts  both ;  not  of  ideas  alone,  without  facts,  for  then  it  would  be 
mere  philosophy:  not  of  facts  alone,  without  ideas  of  which  those  facts 
are  the  symbols,  or  out  of  which  they  arise,  or  upon  which  they  are 
grounded,  for  then  it  would  be  mere  history."— [Coleridge  :  "Table- 
Talk":  Dec.  8,  1831;  Works:  New  York  ed.,  1853:  Vol.  6:  p.  378. 

ni. :  p.  7. — "According  to  the  orthodox  views  of  Indian  theologians, 
not  a  single  line  of  the  Veda  was  the  work  of  human  authors.  The 
whole  Veda  is  in  some  way  or  other  the  work  of  the  Deity :  and  even 
those  who  received  the  revelation,  or,  as  they  express  it,  those  Avho 
saw  it,  were  not  supposed  to  be  ordinary  mortals,  but  beings  raised 
above  the  level  of  common  humanity,  and  less  liable,  therefore,  to 
error  in  the  reception  of  revealed  truth.  .  .  But  let  me  state  at  once 
that  there  is  nothing  in  the  hymns  themselves  to  warrant  such  ex- 
travagant theories.  In  many  a  hymn,  the  author  says  plainly  that  he 
or  his  friends  made  it  to  please  the  gods ;  that  he  made  it  as  a  carpenter 
makes  a  chariot,  or  like  a  beautiful  vesture ;  that  he  fashioned  it  in  his 
heart,  and  kept  it  in  his  mind;  that  he  expects,  as  his  reward,  the  favor 
of  the  god  whom  he  celebrates."  The  poet's  consciousness  of  higher- 
influences  was  but  '  another  expression  of  deep-felt  dependence  on  the 
Deity.' — [MaxMttller:  "  Chips  from  a  German  Workshop  " ;  New  York, 
ed.,  1881:  Vol.  1:  p.  18. 

"We  have  in  these  writings,  as  a  whole  [the  most  ancient  docu- 
ments connected  with  the  religion  of  India],  an  authentic  literature, 
which  professes  to  be  what  it  is,  which  neither  asserts  for  itself  a  su- 
pernatural origin,  nor  seeks  to  disguise  its  age  by  recourse  to  the  de- 
vices of  the  pastiche.  .  .  The  religion  which  is  transmitted  to  us  in 
these  Hymns  is,  in  its  principal  features,  this :  Nature  is  throughout 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  I.  363 

divine.  Everything  which  is  impressive  by  its  sublimity,  or  is  sup- 
posed capable  of  affecting  us  for  good  or  evil,  may  become  a  direct  ob 
ject  of  adoration." — [A.  Barth:  "  Religions  of  India;  Boston  ed.,  1882: 
pp.  5,  7,  8. 

'  'Among  the  most  singular  of  the  claims  put  forth  in  behalf  of  Buddha, 
we  may  name  the  assertion  that  though  he  taught  the  same  doctrines 
that  former  Buddhas  had  done,  all  his  revelations  were  the  result  of 
his  own  personal  discovery,  by  means  of  intuition,  entirely  apart  from 
experience,  without  any  instruction  from  another,  and  without  any 
aid  from  tradition,  or  from  any  other  of  the  sources  by  which  knowl- 
edge is  generally  communicated  to  man." — [R.  Spence  Hardy:  "  Leg- 
ends and  Theories  of  the  Buddhists  " ;  London  ed. ,  1866 :  p.  198. 

"As  to  the  publisher  of  the  law,  Buddha  [according  to  Buddhist  au- 
thority], he  is  a  mere  man,  who  during  myriads  of  centuries  has  accu- 
mulated merits  on  merits,  until  he  has  obtained  the  Neibban  of  Kile- 
tha,  or  the  deliverance  from  all  passions.  From  that  moment  till  his 
death  this  eminent  personage  is  constituted  the  master  of  religion  and 
the  doctor  of  the  law.  Owing  to  his  perfect  science  he  finds  out  and 
discovers  all  the  precepts  that  constitute  the  body  of  the  law.  Im- 
pelled by  his  matchless  benevolence  toward  all  beings,  he  promulgates 
them  for  the  salvation  of  all. " — [Bp.  Bigandet :  '  *  Legend  of  Gatidama  " ; 
London  ed.,  1880:  Vol.  2:  p.  193.     [The  Seven  Ways  to  Neibban.] 

lY. :  p.  7. — "The  following  are  some  of  his  [Confucius']  sayings: 
'  The  sage,  and  the  man  of  perfect  virtue, — ^how  dare  I  rank  myself  with 
them  ?  It  may  simply  be  said  of  me  that  I  strive  to  become  such,  without 
satiety,  and  teach  others,  without  weariness.'  '  In  letters  I  am  perhaps 
equal  to  other  men ;  but  the  character  of  the  superior  man,  carrying 
out  in  his  conduct  what  he  professes,  is  what  I  have  not  yet  attained 
to.'  .  .  'I  am  not  one  who  was  bom  in  the  possession  of  knowledge; 
I  am  one  who  is  fond  of  antiquity,  and  earnest  in  seeking  it  there.' 
'  A  transmitter,  and  not  a  maker,  believing  in  and  loving  the  ancients, 
I  venture  to  compare  myself  with  our  old  P'ang.' " — [From  the  Vllth 
Book  of  the  Analects.]  Legge:  "Chinese  Classics":  Proleg.  c.  v.: 
sec.  II. :  §  4. 

"  Twice  a  year,  in  the  middle  months  of  spring  and  autumn,  when 
the  first  ting  day  of  the  month  comes  round,  the  worship  of  Confucius 
is  performed  with  peculiar  solemnity.  At  the  imperial  college  the 
Emperor  himself  is  required  to  attend  in  state,  and  is  in  fact  the  prin- 
cipal performer.  .  .  I  need  not  go  on  to  enlarge  on  the  homage  which 
the  Emperors  of  China  render  to  Confucius.  It  could  not  be  more 
complete.  It  is  worship,  and  not  mere  homage.  He  was  unreason- 
ably neglected  when  alive.  He  is  now  unreasonably  venerated  when 
dead.    .    .    The  rulers  of  China  are  not  smgular  in  this  matter,  but  in 


364  APPENDIZ. 

entire  sympathy  with  the  mass  of  their  people."— [Legge:  "Chinese 
Classics " :  Proleg.  ch.  v. :  ss.  1,  2. 

"The  religious  doctrine  of  Kong-tse  is  ethical  naturalism,  founded 
on  the  state  religion  of  the  Tshow.  He  engaged  in  supernatural  ques- 
tions with  as  much  reluctance  as  in  practical  affairs,  and  expressed 
himself  very  cautiously  and  doubtfully  on  religious  points.  Even  of 
heaven  he  preferred  not  to  speak  as  a  pereonal  being,  but  he  quoted  its 
example  as  the  preserver  of  order,  and  he  would  allude  to  its  com- 
mands, ordinances,  and  purposes.  .  .  To  pi'ayer  he  ascribed  no  great 
value.  He  did  not  believe  in  direct  revelations,  and  he  regarded  fore- 
bodings and  presentiments  simply  as  warnings.  .  .  From  the  year  57 
of  our  era  the  worship  of  Kong-tse  by  the  side  of  Tshow  was  practised 
by  the  emperors  themselves  as  well  as  in  all  the  schools ;  and  since  the 
seventh  century  Kong-tse  has  been  worshipped  alone." — [Tiele :  "Hist, 
of  Eeligions";  Boston  ed.,  1881:  pp.  31-34. 

V. :  p.  7. — "Among  these  recluses  arose  one  who  was  noted  as  a  deep 
and  original  thinker,  and  who  became  the  founder  of  Taouism.  This  was 
Laou-Tsze,  the  old  philosopher,  who  was  born  about  fifty  years  before 
Confucius.  .  .  Sze-ma  Tseen  tells  us  nothing  of  his  boyhood  or  of  his 
early  manhood,  but  merely  mentions  that  he  held  office  at  the  imperial 
court  of  Chow,  as  '  Keeper  of  the  Archives. '  .  .  But  though  history 
contains  but  scanty  references  to  the  life  of  Laou-Tsze,  religious  re- 
cords .  .  abound  with  marvellous  tales  of  his  birth  and  career.  By 
some  writers  he  is  declared  to  have  been  a  spiritual  being,  and  the  em- 
bodiment of  Taou ;  without  beginning,  and  without  cause ;  the  ancestor 
of  the  original  breath ;  without  light,  form,  sound,  or  voice ;  having 
neither  ancestors  nor  descendants ;  dark,  yet  having  within  himself  a 
spiritual  substance:  and  that  substance  was  truth." — [Douglas:  "Con 
fucianism  and  Taouism";  London  ed.,  1879:  pp.  174,  176,  179. 

VI. :  p.  7. — "He  [Zoroaster]  is  not  treated  [in  the Parsi catechism]  as 
a  divine  being,  nor  even  as  the  son  of  Ormuzd.  Plato,  indeed,  speaks 
of  Zoroaster  as  the  son  of  Oromazes,  but  this  is  a  mistake,  not  counte- 
nanced, as  far  as  we  are  aware,  by  any  of  the  Parsi  writings,  whether 
ancient  or  modem.  With  the  Parsis,  Zoroaster  is  simply  a  wise  man,  a 
prophet  favored  by  God,  and  admitted  into  God's  immediate  presence ; 
but  all  this,  on  his  own  showing  only,  and  without  any  supernatural 
credentials,  except  some  few  miracles  recorded  of  him  in  books  of 
doubtful  authority."— [Max  MiiUer:  "Chips,  etc.";  N.  YorK  ed.,  1881: 
Vol.  1:  p.  171. 

The  Parsi  tradition  asserts  that  all  the  21  Nasks  [books  of  the  Avesta] 
were  written  by  God  HimseK,  and  given  to  Zoroaster,  as  his  prophet, 
to  forward  them  to  mankind.     But  such  claims  to  God's  immediate 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  L  365 

autlioi'sliip  of  the  whole  Zend-Avesta  are  never  made  in  any  of  the 
books  which  are  now  extant ;  though  the  Yasna,  not  the  Vendidad,. 
lays  claim  to  divine  revelation. — [Haug:  "Essays  on  Sacred  Language 
and  Religion  of  the  Parsis";  London  ed.,  1878:  p.  137. 

VII. :  p.  8. — "No  one  teacher,  or  form  of  Religion,  nor  all  teachers  and 
forms  put  together,  have  exhausted  the  religious  sentiment,  which  is  the 
gi'oundwork  and  standard  -  measm-e  of  them  all,  and  is  represented 
more  or  less  partially  in  each ;  and  so  new  teachers  and  new  forms  of 
Religion  are  always  possible  and  necessary,  until  a  form  is  discovei'ed, 
which  embraces  all  the  facts  of  man's  moral  and  religious  nature,  sets 
forth  and  legitimates  all  the  laws  thereof,  and  thus  represents  the  Ab- 
solute Religion,  as  it  is  implied  in  the  Facts  of  man's  nature  or  the  Ideas 
of  God.  .  .  It  [the  Absolute  Religion]  lays  down  no  creed :  asks  no 
symbol :  reverences  exclusively  no  time  nor  place,  and  therefore  can 
use  all  times  and  every  place.  It  reckons  forms  useful  to  such  as  they 
may  help :  one  man  may  commune  with  God  through  the  bread  and  the 
wine,  emblems  of  the  body  that  was  broke  and  the  blood  that  was  shed, 
in  the  cause  of  truth ;  another  may  hold  commimion  through  the  moss 
and  the  violet,  the  mountain,  the  ocean,  or  the  scripture  of  suns,  which 
God  has  writ  in  the  sky.  .  .  Its  temple  is  all  space;  its  shrine  the 
good  heart ;  its  Creed  all  truth ;  its  Ritual  works  of  love  and  utility ; 
its  Profession  of  Faith  a  divine  life,  works  without,  faith  within,  love 
of  God  and  man." — [Theodore  Parker:  "Discourse of  Religion " ;  Bos^ 
ton  ed.,  1842:  pp.  238-9:  478-9. 

"Faith,  in  her  early  stages,  is  governed  by  the  senses,  and  there- 
fore contemplates  a  temporal  history:  what  she  holds  to  be  true  is  the 
external  ordinary  event,  the  evidence  for  which  is  of  the  historical,  foren- 
sic kind, — a  fact  to  be  proved  by  the  testimony  of  the  senses,  and  the 
moral  confidence  inspired  by  the  witnesses.  But  mind  having  once 
taken  occasion  of  this  external  fact  to  bring  under  its  consciousness  the 
idea  of  humanity  as  one  with  God,  sees  in  the  history  only  the  presen- 
tation of  that  idea;  the  object  of  faith  is  completely  changed;  instead 
of  a  sensible,  empirical  fact,  it  has  become  a  spiritual  and  divine  idea^ 
which  has  its  confirmation  no  longer  in  history  but  in  philosophy. 
When  the  mind  has  thus  gone  beyond  the  sensible,  and  entered  into 
the  domain  of  the  Absolute,  the  former  ceases  to  be  essential." — 
[Strauss:  " Life  of  Jesus " ;  London  ed.  1846:  Vol.  IIL:  p.  439. 

VIII. :  p.  8. — The  ancient  legend  of  the  Divine  instruction  of  Numa 
is  thus  pleasantly  told  by  Niebuhr : — 

"He  was  revered  as  the  author  of  the  Roman  ceremonial  law.  In- 
structed by  the  Camena  Egeria,  who  was  espoused  to  him  in  a  visible 
form,  and  who  led  him  into  the  assemblies  of  her  sisters  in  the  sacred 


SQQ  AFFENDIX. 

grove,  he  regulated  the  whole  hierarchy ;  the  pontiffs,  who  took  care, 
by  precept  and  by  chastisement,  that  the  laws  relating  to  religion  should 
be  observed,  both  by  individuals  and  by  the  state ;  the  augurs,  whose 
calling  it  was  to  afford  security  for  the  counsels  of  men  by  piercing 
into  those  of  the  gods ;  the  flamens,  who  ministered  in  the  temples  of 
the  supreme  deities;  the  chaste  virgins  of  Vesta;  the  Salii,  who  solem 
nized  the  worship  of  the  gods  with  armed  dances  and  songs.  He  pre- 
scribed the  rites  according  to  which  the  people  might  offer  worship  and 
prayer  acceptable  to  the  gods.  .  .  Numa  was  not  a  theme  of  song,  like 
Romulus ;  indeed  he  enjoined  that,  among  all  the  Camenae,  the  high- 
est honors  should  be  paid  to  Tacita.  Yet  a  story  was  handed  down, 
that,  when  he  was  entertaining  his  guests,  the  plain  food  in  the 
earthen- ware  dishes  was  turned,  on  the  appearance  of  Egeria,  into  a 
banquet  fit  for  gods,  in  vessels  of  gold :  in  order  that  her  divinity 
might  be  made  manifest  to  the  incredulous.  The  temple  of  Janus,  his 
work,  continued  always  shut :  peace  was  spread  over  Italy :  until 
Numa,  hke  the  darlings  of  the  gods  in  the  golden  age,  fell  asleep,  full 
of  days.  Egeria  melted  away  in  tears  into  a  fountain." — ["  History  of 
Rome";  London  ed.,  1855:  Vol.  1:  pp.  239-40. 

"The  original  hearers  of  the  mythes  felt  neither  surprise  nor  dis- 
pleasure from  this  confusion  of  the  divine  with  the  human  individual. 
They  looked  at  the  past  with  a  film  of  faith  over  their  eyes — neither 
knowing  the  value,  nor  desiring  the  attainment,  of  an  unclouded 
vision.  The  intimate  companionship,  and  the  occasional  mistake  of 
identity,  between  gods  and  men,  were  in  full  harmony  with  their  rev- 
erential retrospect.  And  we  accordingly  see  the  poet  Ovid  in  his  Fasti, 
when  he  undertakes  the  task  of  unfolding  the  legendary  antiquities  of 
early  Rome,  re-acquiring,  by  the  inspiration  of  Juno,  the  power  of 
seeing  gods  and  men  in  immediate  vicinity  and  conjunct  action,  such 
as  it  existed  before  the  development  of  the  critical  and  historical  sense." 
— [Grote:  "Hist,  of  Greece";  London  ed.,  1872:  Vol.  1:  p.  404. 

IX. :  p.  13. — Lactantius  was  probably  etymologically  wrong  in  what 
he  wrote  respecting  the  primitive  meaning  of  the  word  '  Religion ' : — 

' '  We  are  bound  and  tied  to  God  by  this  chain  of  piety ;  from  which 
Religion  itself  received  its  name,  not,  as  Cicero  explained  it,  from  care- 
fully gathering :  since  in  his  second  book  concerning  the  nature  of  the 
gods  he  thus  speaks:  'For  not  only  philosophers,  but  our  ancestors 
also,  separated  superstition  from  religion.  They  who  spent  whole  days 
in  prayers  and  sacrifices,  that  their  children  might  survive  them,  were 
called  superstitious.  But  they  who  handled  again,  and  as  it  were  care- 
fully gathered,  all  things  which  related  to  the  worship  of  the  gods, 
were  called  religious  —  from  such  careful  gathering  :  as  some  were 
called  elegant,  from  choosing  out;  diligent,  from  carefully  selecting; 
intelligent,  from  understanding.'" — [Divine  Institutes :  IV.:  28. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  I.  367 

Tl»e  more  correct  derivation  of  the  word  is  probably  that  given  by 
Oicera:  from  relegere,  not  religare.  But  it  T^as  a  true  and  deep  sense 
of  the  spiritual  import  of  the  word — which  already,  in  his  time,  had 
iaken  upon  it  a  grander  meaning  than  before  it  had  borne — which  in 
this  instance  perhaps  beguiled  the  judgment  of  the  learned  and  elo- 
<iuent  Christian  apologist. 

X. :  p.  14. — "  How  can  I  comprehend  this  ?  How  is  this  to  be  proved  ? 
To  the  first  question  I  should  answer:  Christianity  is  not  a  theory,  or  a 
speculation,  but  a  life : — not  a  philosophy  of  life,  but  a  life,  and  a  living 
process.  To  the  second :  Try  it.  It  has  been  eighteen  hundred  years  in 
existence ;  and  has  one  individual  left  a  record  like  the  following?  '  I 
tried  it,  and  it  did  not  answer.  I  made  the  experiment  faithfully,  ac- 
<5ording  to  the  directions ;  and  the  result  has  been  a  conviction  of  my 
own  creduhty.' .  .  If  neither  your  own  experience  nor  the  history  of 
almost  two  thousand  years  has  presented  a  single  testimony  to  this 
purport;  and  if  you  have  read  and  heard  of  many  who  have  lived  and 
died  bearing  witness  to  the  contrary ;  and  if  you  have  yourself  met 
with  some  one  in  whom  on  any  other  point  you  would  place  unquali- 
fied trust,  who  has  on  his  own  experience  made  report  to  you  that  He  is 
faithful  who  promised,  and  what  He  promised  He  has  proved  Himself 
able  to  perform :  is  it  bigotry,  if  I  fear  that  the  unbelief  which  pre- 
judges and  prevents  the  experiment,  has  its  source  elsewhere  than  in 
the  uncorrupted  judgment  ?  that  not  the  strong  free  mind,  but  the  en- 
slaved will,  is  the  true  original  infidel  in  this  instance  ? " — [Coleridge : 
Works:  New  York  ed.,  1853;  Vol.  1:  p.  233. 

' '  There  is  another  evidence  of  Christianity,  still  more  internal  than 
any  on  which  I  have  dwelt,  an  evidence  to  be  felt  rather  than  described, 
but  not  less  real  because  founded  on  feeling.  I  refer  to  that  conviction 
of  the  divine  original  of  our  religion,  which  springs  up  and  continually 
gains  strength  in  those  who  apply  it  habitually  to  their  tempers  and 
lives,  and  who  imbibe  its  spirit  and  hopes.  In  such  men  there  is  a  con- 
sciousness of  the  adaptation  of  Christianity  to  their  noblest  faculties ;  a 
consciousness  of  its  exalting  and  consoling  influences,  of  its  power  to 
confer  the  true  happiness  of  human  nature,  to  give  that  peace  which 
the  world  cannot  give ;  which  assures  them  that  it  is  not  of  earthly 
origin,  but  a  ray  from  the  Everlasting  Light,  a  stream  from  the  fount- 
ain of  Heavenly  Wisdom  and  Love.  This  is  the  evidence  which  sus- 
tains the  faith  of  thousands  who  never  read  and  cannot  undei'stand 
the  learned  books  of  Christian  apologists,  who  want  perhaps  words  to 
explain  the  ground  of  their  belief,  but  whose  faith  is  of  adamantine 
firmness,  who  hold  the  Gospel  with  a  conviction  niore  intimate  and 
unwavering  than  mere  argument  ever  produced." — [Dr.  Channing: 
Works;  Boston  ed.,  1843:  Vol.  3:  p.  135. 


36S  APPENDIX. 

XI. :  p.  14. — "They  [the  Christian  doctrines]  will  appear  to  us  als<i 
notions  and  opinions  about  certain  great  subjects :  divine  notions  and 
opinions  we  may  call  them ;  but  a  mere  name  will  not  change  their 
character:  we  shall  not  feel  that  they  have  to  do  with  our  own  life  and 
being;  we  shall  regard  them  as  truths  which  we  are  to  liold,  not  as 
truths  which  are  to  hold  us,  which  are  to  give  us  a  standing-- groun'i 
for  time  and  for  eternity." — [F.  D.  Maurice :  "Religions  of  the  World  "; 
London  ed.,  1877:  p.  164. 

XII. :  p.  15. — "  Many  a  man  will  live  and  die  upon  a  dogma :  no  man 
will  be  a  martyr  for  a  conclusion.  .  .  Logic  makes  but  a  sorry  rhet- 
oric with  the  multitude ;  first  shoot  around  corners,  and  you  may  not 
despair  of  converting  by  a  syllogism.  .  .  Life  is  not  long  enough 
for  a  religion  of  inferences;  we  shall  never  have  done  beginning, 
if  we  determine  to  begin  with  proof.  .  .  It  is  very  well,  as  a  matter 
of  liberal  curiosity  and  of  philosophy,  to  analyze  our  modes  of  thought; 
but  let  this  come  second,  and  when  there  is  leisure  for  it,  and  then  our 
examinations  will  in  many  ways  even  be  subservient  to  action.  But 
if  we  commence  with  scientific  knowledge  and  argumentative  proof, 
or  lay  any  great  stress  upon  it  as  the  basis  of  personal  Christianity,  or 
attempt  to  make  men  moral  and  religious  by  libraries  and  museums, 
let  us  in  consistency  take  chemists  for  our  cooks  and  mineralogists  for 
our  masons." — [Dr.  J.  H.  Newman:  Letter,  reprinted  in  "Grammar 
of  Assent";  New  York  ed.,  1870:  pp.  90-92. 

i  et  Bossuet  says,  in  a  vigorous  passage  of  his  first  Pastoral  Instruc- 
tion:— "Two  things  establish  our  faith:  the  miracles  of  Jesus  Christ, 
wrought  in  the  sight  of  his  apostles  and  of  all  the  people,  with  the  evi- 
dent and  perpetual  accomplishment  of  his  predictions  and  his  promises. 
.  .  Thus,  as  St.  Augustine  says,  our  faith  is  established  on  two 
sides.  Neither  the  apostles  nor  we  could  doubt  concerning  it;  that 
which  they  saw  at  the  fountain-head  assured  them  of  all  that  would 
afterward  follow ;  that  which  we  see  in  the  subsequent  time  gives  us 
assurance  of  what  they  saw  and  were  astonished  at  in  the  beginning." 
— [CEuvres:  Paris  ed.,  1822;  Tom.  XV.,  pp.  277-8. 

The  eminent  and  accomplished  Jesuit  theologian,  Perrone,  whose 
"  Preelectiones  Theologicae"  have  passed  through  many  editions,  and' 
have  been  translated  into  different  Continental  languages,  devotes  the 
fundamental  chapters  of  his  great  work  to  the  elaborate  consideration 
of  the  marks  of  Christianity  as  a  Divine  and  supernatural  Revelation, 
which  are  found  in  Miracles,  in  Prophecies  fulfilled,  in  the  surpassing 
excellence  and  purity  of  the  doctrine  of  the  Gospel,  in  its  remarkable 
propagation  and  preservation  in  the  world,  and  in  the  wonderful  wit- 
ness of  martyrs  to  it.  His  discussion  of  the  whole  matter  is  equally 
learned,  acute,  and  energetic— [See  "Prselect.  Theol.";  Paris  ed», 
1863:  Vol.  1:  pp.  24-122. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  1.  309 

XIII. :  p.  17. — "While  the  Greeks  had  been  innocent  in  their  sei^nw 
unconsciousness  of  sin  or  shame,  the  extravagances  of  the  Renaissance 
were  guilty,  turbid,  and  morbid,  because  they  were  committed  defiantly, 
in  open  reprobacy,  in  scorn  of  the  acknowledged  law.  What  was  at 
woret  bestial  in  the  Greeks,  has  become  devilish  in  the  Renaissance. 
How  different  from  a  true  Greek  is  Benvenuto  Cellini :  how  unlike  the 
monsters  even  of  Greek  mythic  story  is  Francesco  Cenci:  how  far 
more  awful  in  his  criminality  is  the  Borgia  than  any  despot  of  Greek 
colony  or  island  " !— [Symonds :  ' '  Studies  of  Greek  Poets  " :  First  Series : 
London  ed.,  1877:  p.  254. 

XIV. :  p.  19. — "There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  perception  of  truth  is 
very  materially  influenced  by  the  moral  condition  of  the  mind.  How 
powerful  are  the  arguments  in  favor  of  the  Gospel  derived  from  the 
moral  beauty  and  symmetry  of  the  system,  from  the  originahty  and 
loftiness  of  our  Saviour's  character,  from  the  adaptation  of  his  religion 
to  the  wants  of  the  human  mind  under  all  its  countless  varieties !  And 
yet  this  species  of  evidence  will  be  wholly  without  effect  on  those 
whose  minds  are  destitute  of  moral  sensibility  and  refinement." — [James 
Martineau:  " Studies  of  Christianity  " :  Boston  ed.,  1866:  p.  486. 

"Amid  the  vicissitudes  of  the  intellect,  worship  retains  its  stability: 
and  the  truth  which,  it  would  seem,  cannot  be  proved,  is  unaffected  by 
an  infinite  series  of  refutations.  How  evident  that  it  has  its  ultimate 
seat,  not  in  the  mutable  judgments  of  the  understanding,  but  in  the 
native  sentiments  of  Conscience,  and  the  inexhaustible  aspirations  of 
Affection!  The  supreme  certainty  must  needs  be  too  true  to  be 
proved  :  and  the  highest  perfection  can  appear  doubtful  only  to 
Sensualism  and  Sin. " — [James  Martineau :  * '  Miscellanies  " ;  Boston  ed. ,. 
1853:  p.  167. 

"The  prophecies,  the  miracles  even,  and  the  other  proofs  of  our  rehg- 
lon,  are  not  of  such  a  sort  that  we  can  say  that  they  are  mathematically 
convincing.  But  it  is  enough  for  the  present  if  you  agree  with  me 
that  it  is  not  to  offend  against  reason  to  believe  them.  They  possess 
at  once  clearness  and  obscurity,  so  as  to  enlighten  some  and  darken 
others.  But  the  clearness  is  such  that  it  surpasses,  or  at  the  least 
equals,  that  which  is  most  apparent  on  the  other  side :  so  that  it  is  not 
the  reason  which  can  decide  us  not  to  follow  it :  and  it  n^ay  be  only  the 
concupiscence  and  wickedness  of  the  heart. " — [Pascal :  ' '  Pens^es  " :  Sec. 
Par.,  Art.  xvii. :  20. 

XV. :  p.  20. — A  remark  of  Madame  de  Sta6l  seems  to  throw  a  certain 
unintended  light  on  the  miracles  of  the  first  Christian  age : — 

"Violent  concussions  are  needful  to  carry  the  human  mind  to  ob- 
jects entirely  new :  as  earthquake-shocks  and  subterranean  fires  have 
24 


370  APPENDIX. 

i-evealed  to  men  riches  to  which  time  alone  would  never  have  sufficed 
to  channel  the  way." — ["De  la  Litterature  " :  CEuvres:  Paris  ed.,  1820: 
Tom.  IV.  :  p.  206. 

"That  He  also  raised  the  dead,  and  that  this  is  no  fiction  of  those 
who  composed  the  Gospels,  is  shown  by  this :  that  if  it  had  been  a  fic- 
tion, many  individuals  would  have  been  represented  as  having  risen 
from  the  dead.  But,  as  it  is  no  fiction,  they  are  very  easily  counted  of 
whom  this  is  related  to  have  happened.  .  .  I  would  say,  moreover^ 
that  agreeably  to  the  promise  of  Jesus,  His  disciples  performed  even 
greater  works  than  these  miracles  of  Jesus,  which  were  perceptible 
only  to  the  senses.  For  the  eyes  of  those  who  are  blind  in  soul  are 
ever  opened:  and  the  ears  of  those  who  are  deaf  to  virtuous  words 
listen  readily  to  the  doctrine  of  God,  and  of  the  blessed  life  with  Him : 
and  many  who  were  lame  in  the  feet  of  the  '  inner  man,'  as  Scripture 
calls  it,  havmg  now  been  healed  by  the  word,  do  not  simply  leap,  but 
leap  as  the  hart,  which  is  an  animal  hostile  to  serpents,  and  stronger 
than  all  the  poison  of  vipers." — [Origen:    adv.  Celsus:  H. :  xlviii. 

XVI. :  p.  20. — "I  do  not  hereby  deny  in  the  least  that  God  can  do,  or 
hath  done,  nuracles  for  the  confii'mation  of  truth :  but  I  only  say  that 
we  cannot  think  he  should  do  them  to  enforce  doctrines  or  notions  of 
himself,  or  any  worship  of  him,  not  conformable  to  reason,  or  that  we 
can  receive  such  for  truth  for  the  miracles'  sake :  and  even  in  those 
boolcs  which  have  the  greatest  proof  of  revelation  from  God,  and  the 
attestation  of  miracles  to  confirm  their  being  so,  the  miracles  are  to  l>e 
judged  by  the  doctrine,  and  not  the  doctrine  by  the  miracles. " — [Refi^. : 
Deut.  13  :  1-3  ;  Gal.  1  :  8.]  [John  Locke  :  quoted  in  Lord  King's 
"Life";  London  ed.,  1830  :  Vol.  1  :  pp.  233-4. 

Pascal  says : — 

"We  must  judge  of  the  doctrine  by  the  miracles,  but  at  the  same 
time  of  the  miracles  by  the  doctrine.  The  doctrine  attests  the  miracles, 
and  the  miracles  attest  the  doctrine.  All  this  is  true,  and  there  is  in  it 
no  contradiction."  But  he  adds,  also:  "The  miracles  have  served  for 
the  foundation,  and  they  will  serve  for  the  continuance  of  the  church, 
until  Antichrist  comes,  even  unto  the  end." — ["Pens6es":  Sec.  Par.: 
Art.  XVI. :  1,  6. 

XVII.:  p.  21. — "With  each  miracle  worked  there  was  a  truth  re- 
vealed, which  thenceforward  was  to  act  as  its  substitute.  .  .  It  was  only 
to  overthrow  the  usurpation  exercised  in  and  through  the  senses,  that 
the  senses  were  miraculously  appealed  to :  for  reason  and  religion  ar< 
their  own  evidence.  The  natural  sun  is  in  this  respect  a  symbol  of  the 
spiritual.  Ere  he  is  fully  arisen,  and  while  his  glories  are  still  under 
veil,  he  calls  up  the  breeze  to  chase  away  the  usuri)ing  vapors  of  tho 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  I.  371 

eight-season,  and  thus  converts  the  air  itself  into  the  minister  of  it* 
own  purification :  not  surely  in  proof  or  elucidation  of  the  light  from 
heaven,  but  to  prevent  its  interception." — [Coleridge  :  "Statesman's 
Manual."  Works;  New  York  ed.,  1853  :  Vol.  1  :  p.  425. 

The  impressive  moral  lessons  always  implied  in  the  miracles  of  the 
Lord  constitute  a  just  and  forcible  argument  for  them.  The  spiritual 
meanmgs  so  illustriously  set  before  men  surpass  any  limits  of  time, 
and  are  equally  vital  for  each  generation.  Goethe  missed  the  true  les- 
son of  one  of  the  miracles  referred  to  by  him :  but  even  then  he  saw  in 
it  a  secondary  significance,  of  secular  value : — 

"I  have  been  reading  in  the  New  Testament,  and  thinking  of  a  pic- 
ture Goethe  showed  me,  of  Christ  walking  on  the  water,  and  Peter 
coming  towards  him,  at  the  moment  when  the  apostle  begins  to  sink, 
in  consequence  of  losing  faith  for  a  moment.  '  This, '  said  Goethe,  '  is 
a  most  beautiful  history,  and  one  which  I  love  better  than  any.  It 
expresses  the  noble  doctrine,  that  man,  through  faith  and  animated 
courage,  may  come  off  victor  in  the  most  dangerous  enterprises,  while 
he  may  be  ruined  by  a  momentary  paroxysm  of  doubt. ' " — [Eckermann : 
"Conv.  with  Goethe";  Boston  ed.,  1839  :  p.  359. 

XVIII. :  p.  32. — "  Christ's  miracles  are  in  unison  with  his  whole  char- 
acter, and  bear  a  proportion  to  it,  like  that  which  we  observe  in  the 
most  harmonious  productions  of  nature :  and  in  this  way  they  receive 
from  it  great  confinnation.  And  the  same  presumption  in  their  favor 
arises  from  his  religion.  That  a  religion  carrying  in  itself  such  marks 
of  divmity,  and  so  .inexplicable  on  human  principles,  should  receive 
outward  confirmations  from  Omnipotence,  is  not  surprising.  The  ex- 
traordinary character  of  the  religion  accords  with  and  seems  to  demand 
extraordinary  interpositions  in  its  behalf.  Its  miracles  are  not  solitary, 
naked,  unexplained,  disconnected  events,  but  are  bound  up  with  a  sys- 
tem, which  is  worthy  of  God,  and  impressed  with  God ;  which  occu- 
pies a  large  space,  and  is  operating  with  great  and  increasing  energy, 
in  human  affairs." — [Dr.  Channing:  Works;  Boston  ed.,  1843:  Vol. 
S:  pp.  130-131. 

' '  The  miracles  of  the  evangelic  history  come  to  us  with  the  force  of 
CoNGRUiTY,  just  so  far  as  we  can  bring  oui'selves  morally  within  the 
splendour  of  those  eternal  verities  which  are  of  the  substance  of  the 
Gospel.  While  we  stand  remote  from  that  illuminated  field,  they  are 
to  us  only  a  galling  perplexity :  for  we  can  neither  rid  ourselves  of  the 
evidence  that  attests  them,  nor  are  we  prepared  to  yield  ourselves  to 
it.  .  .  Antiquity  had  not  conceived  of  a  worker  of  miracles  in  whose 
course  of  life  and  behaviour  the  working  of  miracles  showed  itself  as  a 
secondary  and  incidental  element,  and  in  whose  character  Love  was 
of  the  substance,  while  the  supernatural  faculty  was  the  adjunct." — 
llsaac  Taylor :  ' '  Restoration  of  Belief  " ;  Boston  ed. ,  1867 :  pp.  217,  222. 


372  APPENDIX. 

XIX. :  p.  22. — Cicero  only  fairly  represents  the  impression  of  a  Di 
vine  instruction,  universally  made  upon  men  by  what  they  esteem  ful 
filled  predictions : — 

"  There  is  certainly  a  power  of  prediction  which  appears  in  many 
places,  times,  states  of  affairs,  both  as  concerning  private  matters  and, 
more  especially,  in  regard  to  public  affairs.  The  interpreters  of  sacri- 
fices discern  many  things,  the  augurs  foresee  many;  many  are  de- 
clared by  oracles,  many  by  prophecies,  many  by  dreams,  many  by 
xiortents :  which  things  becoming  known,  the  manifold  affaii*s  of  men 
are  often  wisely  and  prosperously  conducted,  and  many  dangers  are 
avoided.  This  power,  therefore,  or  art,  or  natural  faculty,  is  certainly 
given  to  men  for  a  knowledge  of  future  things,  nor  is  it  given  to  any 
]3ut  by  the  immortal  gods.  .  .  This  consideration  has  moved  the 
poets.  Homer  especially,  to  join  to  their  chief  heroes,  Ulysses,  Achilles, 
and  others,  certain  deities,  as  companions  of  their  adventures  and  per- 
ils."—[Nat.  Deor.  II.:  65,  66. 

XX. :  p.  22.—"  Since,  then,  we  prove  that  all  things  which  have  al- 
ready happened  had  been  predicted  by  the  prophets  before  they  came 
to  pass,  we  must  of  necessity  believe,  also,  that  those  things  which  are 
in  like  manner  predicted,  but  are  still  to  come  to  pass,  shall  certainly 
happen.  For  as  the  things  which  have  already  taken  place  came  to 
pass  when  foretold,  and  even  though  unknown,  so  shall  the  things 
that  reftiain,  even  though  they  be  unknown  and  disbelieved,  yet  come 
to  pass.  .  .  So  many  things,  therefore,  as  these,  when  they  are  seen 
with  the  eye,  are  enough  to  produce  conviction  and  belief  in  those 
who  embrace  the  truth,  and  ai^e  not  bigoted  in  their  opinions,  nor 
governed  by  their  passions." — [Justin  Martyr :  Apol.  I.:  52,  53. 

'*  But  whence  could  the  prophets  have  had  power  to  predict  the  ad- 
vent of  the  King,  and  to  preach  beforehand  that  liberty  which  was 
bestowed  by  Him,  and  previously  to  announce  all  things  which  were 
done  by  Christ,  His  words.  His  works,  and  His  sufferings,  and  to  pre- 
dict the  new  covenant,  if  they  had  received  prophetical  inspiration 
from  another  God  [than  the  One  revealed  in  the  Gospel]  ?  .  .  Neither 
are  ye  in  a  position  to  say  that  these  things  came  to  pass  by  a  certain 
kind  of  chance,  as  if  they  were  spoken  by  the  prophets  in  regard  to 
some  other  person,  while  like  events  happened  to  the  Lord.  For  all 
the  prophets  prophesied  these  same  things,  but  they  never  came  to 
pass  in  the  case  of  any  one  of  the  ancients.  .  .  Therefore  the  prophets 
spake  not  of  any  one  else  but  of  the  Lord,  in  whom  all  these  aforesaid 
tokens  concurred." — [Irenajus:  "  against  Heresies  " :  IV.:  34,  §3. 

"  The  two  parts,  of  which  the  Scriptures  consist,  are  connected,  by  a 
chain  of  compositions  which  bear  no  resemblance  in  form  or  style  to 
any  that  can  be  produced  from  the  stores  of  Grecian,  Indian,  Persian, 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  I.  373 

or  even  Arabian  learning:  the  antiquity  of  these  compositions  no  man 
doubts :  and  the  unstrained  application  of  them  to  events  long  subs© 
quent  to  their  pubHcation  is  a  soHd  ground  of  belief  that  they  were 
genuine  predictions,  and  consequently  inspired." — [Sir  William  Jones: 
Works;  London  ed.,  1807:  Vol.  3:  p.  183. 

XXI. :  p.  23. — "  Even  supposing,  however,  that  apart  from  the  New 
Testament  it  were  possible  to  bring  any  one  to  a  beUef  in  the  inspira- 
tion of  the  prophets  (which,  moreover,  there  would  be  no  other  means 
of  effeciing  but  by  the  prophet's  own  testimony  that  God's  word  had 
come  to  him),  yet  no  faith  in  Christ  as  the  'end  of  the  law  for  right- 
eousness '  could  be  developed  out  of  such  a  belief.  On  the  contrary, 
we  shall  come  nearer  to  expressing  the  whole  truth  if  we  say  that  we 
believe  in  the  inspiration  of  the  prophets  solely  on  the  ground  of  the 
use  which  Christ  and  the  apostles  made  of  their  prophecies." — [Schleier- 
macher:  quoted  by  Bunsen:  "Grod  in  History";  London  ed.,  1870: 
Vol.  3:  p.  263. 

XXTT. :  p.  23. — '*  It  will  surprise  some,  that,  with  the  exception  of  a 
few  spurious  productions,  I  consider  the  predictions  of  the  prophets — 
which  have  hitherto  been  conmionly  regarded  as  disguised  historical 
descriptions — as  actual  presentiments  of  the  future,  though  without 
denying  their  limited  extent  in  history,  or  attributing  to  their  authors 
a  superhuman  degree  of  infallibility.  .  .  The  authors  of  these  books, 
for  the  most  part,  bear  the  name  of  prophets,  interpreters  of  God.  .  . 
They  were  likewise  called  seers^  on  account  of  the  higher  intuition  they 
had  of  divine  truth,  and,  enlightened  by  that,  of  the  course  of  earthly 
events,  both  present  and  future,  by  virtue  of  which  they  were  prophets 
and  foretellers  of  the  future.  .  .  Without  wishing  to  deny  that  there 
was  a  direct  and  immediate  revelation — that  is,  an  actual  Divine  excite- 
ment, and,  in  some  cases,  an  actual  ecstasy  or  trance — I  only  maintain 
that  it  was  indirect  and  mediate  also,  and  that  there  was  something 
arbitrary  in  the  style  of  their  discourse. " — [De  Wette  :  * '  Introd.  to 
Old  Testament":  (Parker's  trans.);  Boston  ed.,  1859:  Vol.  1:  p.  v.: 
Vol.  2 :  pp.  851-2,  860. 

"With  these  limitations,  it  is  acknowledged  by  all  students  of  the 
subject  that  the  Hebrew  prophets  made  predictions  concerning  the 
fortunes  of  their  own  and  other  countries  which  were  unquestion- 
ably fulfilled.  There  can  be  no  reasonable  doubt,  for  example,  thai 
Amos  foretold  the  captivity  and  return  of  Israel :  and  Michael  the  fall 
of  Samaria :  and  Ezekiel  the  fall  of  Jerusalem :  and  Isaiah  the  fall  of 
Tyre :  and  Jeremiah  the  limits  of  the  captivity.  .  .  I  pass  to  the  sec- 
ond grand  example  of  the  predictive  spirit  of  the  Prophets.  .  .  It  is  a 
€imple  and  universally  recognized  fact  that,  filled  with  these  Prophetic 


374  APPENDi:^. 

imag-es,  the  whole  Jewish  nation — nay,  at  last  the  whole  East^iu 
world — did  look  forward  with  longing  expectation  to  the  coming  of 
this  future  Conqueror.  Was  this  unparalleled  expectation  realized  ? 
Aiid  here  again  I  speak  of  facts  which  are  acknowledged  by  Grermana 
and  Frenchmen,  no  less  than  by  Englishmen,  by  critics  and  by  scep- 
tics, even  more  fully  than  by  theologians  and  ecclesiastics.  There 
did  arise  out  of  this  nation  a  Character  by  universal  consent  as  unpar- 
alleled as  the  expectation  which  had  preceded  him.  Jesus  of  Nazareth 
was,  on  the  most  superficial  no  less  than  on  the  deepest  view  we  take 
of  His  coming,  the  greatest  name,  the  most  extraordinary  power,  that 
has  ever  crossed  the  stage  of  History.  And  this  greatness  consisted 
not  in  outward  power,  but  precisely  in  those  qualities  on  which  from 
first  to  last  the  Prophetic  order  had  laid  the  utmost  stress, — justice 
and  love,  goodness  and  truth." — [Dean  Stanley :  '^ History  of  Jewish 
Church";  N.  York  ed.,  1863:  Part  1:  pp.  517,  519-20. 

' '  The  greatest  of  the  proofs  of  Jesus  Christ  are  the  Prophecies.  .  . 
Even  if  one  man  had  made  a  book  of  predictions  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  to 
the  time  and  the  manner  of  his  coming,  and  if  Jesus  Christ  had  come 
in  conformity  with  these  prophecies,  this  would  be  of  an  infinite  weight. 
But  there  is  here  a  great  deal  more.  There  is  a  succession  of  men  who, 
during  four  thousand  years,  constantly  and  without  variation,  come, 
one  after  the  other,  predicting  the  same  event.  There  is  a  whole  peo- 
ple which  announces  him,  and  which  subsists  during  four  thousand 
years  in  order  still  to  render  their  testimony  of  the  assurances  which 
they  have  of  him,  from  which  they  cannot  be  turned  aside  by  any 
menaces  or  any  pei-secutions  which  befall  them.  This  is  in  a  very  dif- 
ferent degree  important." — [Pascal:  "Pensees":  Sec.  Par. :  Art.  xi. :  1. 

XXni. :  p.  24. — "While  I  was  giving  my  most  earnest  attention  to 
the  matter  [of  the  Heathen  rites],  I  happened  to  meet  with  certain  bar- 
baric wi'itings,  too  old  to  be  compared  with  the  opinions  of  the  Greeks, 
and  too  divine  to  be  compared  with  their  errors ;  and  I  was  led  to  put 
faith  in  these,  by  the  unpretending  cast  of  their  language,  the  inarti- 
ficial character  of  the  writers,  the  foreknowledge  displayed  of  future 
events,  the  excellent  quality  of  the  precepts,  and  the  declaration  of 
the  government  of  the  universe  as  centered  in  one  Being." — [Tatian: 
"Address  to  the  Greeks":  xxix. 

XXrV. :  p.  25. — Nothing  is  more  instructive  or  impressive  in  con 
nection  with  the  Evidences  of  Christianity  than  the  unique  impression 
made  by  the  person  of  Christ  as  shown  in  the  Gospels  on  minds  widely 
differing,  in  power,  culture,  and  moral  sensibility — even  on  minds  in 
v\'hich  a  sceptical  spirit  has  prevailed.  A  few  examples  are  given, 
vhich  might  be  multiplied  almost  indefinitely.     These  are  taken,  pur 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  I.  375 

poseiy,  from  those  representing  widely  different  convictions  and  tend- 
encies : — 

*'It  was  reserved  for  Christianity  to  present  to  the  world  an  ideal 
character,  which  through  all  the  changes  of  eighteen  centuries  has  in- 
spired the  hearts  of  men  with  an  impassioned  love,  has  shown  itself 
capable  of  acting  on  all  ages,  nations,  temperaments,  and  conditions, 
has  been  not  only  the  highest  pattern  of  virtue  but  the  strongest  in- 
centive to  its  practice,  and  has  exercised  so  deep  an  influence  that  it 
may  be  truly  said  that  the  simple  record  of  three  short  years  of  active 
life  has  done  more  to  regenerate  and  to  soften  mankind  than  all  the 
disquisitions  of  philosophers,  and  all  the  exhortations  of  moralists. 
This  has  indeed  been  the  well-spring  of  whatever  is  best  and  purest  in 
the  Chi'istian  life.  .  .  The  power  of  the  love  of  Christ  has  been  dis- 
played alike  in  the  most  heroic  pages  of  Christian  martyrdom,  in  the 
most  pathetic  pages  of  Christian  resignation,  in  the  tenderest  pages  of 
Christian  charity." — [Lecky :  "  Hist,  of  Em^opean  Morals  " ;  New  York 
ed.,  1876:  Vol.  3:  pp.  9,  10. 

"And  when  I  come  to  consider  his  life,  his  works,  his  teaching,  the 
marvellous  mingling  in  him  of  grandeur  and  simplicity,  of  sweetness 
and  force,  that  incomprehensible  perfection  which  never  for  a  moment 
fails, — neither  in  the  intimate  familiarity  of  confidence,  nor  in  the  so- 
lemnity of  instructions  addressed  by  him  to  the  people  at  large,  neither 
in  the  Joyfulness  of  the  festival  at  Cana,  nor  amid  the  anguish  of 
Gethsemane,  neither  in  the  glory  of  his  triumph,  nor  in  the  ignominy 
of  his  punishment,  neither  on  Tabor,  in  the  midst  of  the  splendor 
which  environs  him,  nor  upon  Calvary,  where  he  expires,  abandoned 
by  his  friends,  and  forsaken  of  his  Father,  in  inexpressible  sufferings, 
amid  the  frenzied  outcries  and  railing  of  his  enemies : — when  I  con- 
template this  grand  marvel,  which  the  world  has  seen  only  once,  and 
which  has  renewed  the  world,  I  do  not  ask  myseK  if  Christ  was  Divine : 
I  should  be  rather  tempted  to  ask  myself  if  he  were  human ! " — [La 
Mennais:  "  Essai  sur  I'lndifference  " ;  Paris  ed. ,  1823 :  Tom.  IV. :  p.  449. 

"Yet  Nazareth  was  no  Athens,  where  Philosophy  breathed  in  the 
circumambient  air ;  it  had  neither  porch  nor  portico,  nor  even  a  school 
of  the  Prophets.  There  is  God  in  the  heart  of  this  youth.  .  .  The 
mightiest  heart  that  ever  beat,  stirred  by  the  Spirit  of  God,  how  it 
wrought  in  his  bosom !  What  words  of  rebuke,  of  comfort,  counsel, 
admonition,  promise,  hope,  did  he  pour  out:  words  that  stir  the  soul 
as  summer  dews  call  up  the  faint  and  sickly  grass !  What  profound 
instruction  in  his  proverbs  and  discourses:  what  wisdom  in  his  homely 
sayings,  so  rich  with  Jewish  life;  what  deep  divinity  of  soul  in  his 
prayers,  his  action,  sympathy,  resignation !  .  .  Earely,  almost  never, 
do  we  see  the  vast  divinity  within  that  soul,  which,  new  though  it  was 
in  the  flesh,  at  one  step  goes  before  the  world  whole  thousands  of  yeai*s; 


376  APPENDIX. 

judges  the  race ;  decides  for  us  questions  we  dare  not  agitate  as  yet,  and 
breathes  the  very  hreath  of  heavenly  love.  .  .  Shall  we  be  told,  '  Such 
a  man  never  lived;  the  whole  story  is  a  lie'?  Suppose  that  Plato  and 
Newton  never  lived ;  that  their  story  is  a  lie  I  But  who  did  their  works, 
and  thought  their  thought  ?  It  takes  a  Newton  to  forge  a  Newton. 
What  man  could  have  fabricated  a  Jesus?  None  but  a  Jesus." — 
[Theodore  Parker:  "Discourse  of  Religion";  Boston  ed.,  1842:  pp. 
2Uetseq.,  363. 

' '  What  a  touching  grace  in  his  instructions !  What  sweetness,  yet 
what  purity,  in  his  manners !  What  loftiness  m  his  maxims !  What 
profound  wisdom  in  his  discourses!  What  presence  of  mind,  what 
delicacy  of  art,  yet  what  justice,  in  his  replies !  What  an  empire  over 
his  passions !  Where  is  the  man,  whera  the  sage,  who  knows  thus  how 
to  act,  to  suffer,  and  to  die,  without  weakness,  and  without  ostenta- 
tion ?  What  prejudice,  what  blindness,  must  be  in  him  who  dares  to 
compare  the  son  of  Sophroniscus  with  the  Son  of  Mary  ?  Wliat  a  dis- 
tance lies  between  them !  .  .  Greece  abounded  in  virtuous  men  before 
he  [Socrates]  had  defined  vii'tue.  But  whence  had  Jesus  drawn  for 
his  disciples  that  exalted  and  pure  molality  of  which  he  alone  has 
pi-esented  at  once  the  lessons  and  the  example  ?  Out  of  the  midst  of 
the  fiercest  fanaticism  the  highest  wisdom  made  itself  heard,  and  the 
artlessness  of  the  most  heroical  virtues  glorified  the  vilest  of  all  the 
nations.  The  death  of  Socrates,  philosophizing  quietly  with  his  friends, 
is  the  pleasantest  that  one  could  desire :  that  of  Jesus,  expiring  amid 
torments,  insulted,  railed  at,  cui'sed  by  a  whole  nation,  is  the  most 
horrible  that  any  one  could  fear.  Socrates,  taking  the  poisoned  cup, 
blesses  him  who  presents  it,  and  who  weeps  beside  him :  Jesus,  in  the 
midst  of  a  frightful  anguish,  prays  for  his  maddened  executioners. 
Yes  !  if  the  life  and  the  death  of  Socrates  are  those  of  a  philosopher, 
the  life  and  the  death  of  Jesus  are  those  of  a  God. " — [J.  J.  Rousseau : 
"llmile";  CEuvres:  Paris  ed.,  1793:  Tom.  IX.:  pp.  40-42. 

* '  Whatever  else  may  be  taken  away  from  us  by  rational  criticism, 
Christ  is  still  left :  a  unique  figure,  not  more  unlike  all  his  precui'soi's 
than  all  his  foUoAvei'S,  even  those  who  had  the  direct  benefit  of  his 
pei^onal  teaching.  It  is  of  no  use  to  say  that  Christ  as  exhibited  in 
the  Gospels  is  not  historical,  and  that  we  know  not  how  much  of  what 
is  admirable  has  been  superadded  by  the  tradition  of  his  followers. 
The  tradition  of  followers  sufiices  to  insert  any  number  of  maiwels, 
tind  may  have  inserted  all  the  miracles  which  he  is  reputed  to  have 
wrought.  But  who  among  his  followers,  or  among  their  proselytes, 
was  capable  of  inventing  the  sayings  ascribed  to  Jesus,  or  of  imagining 
the  life  and  character  revealed  in  the  Gospels  ?  Certainly  not  the  fish- 
ermen of  Galilee :  as  certainly  not  St.  Paul,  whose  character  and  idio- 
Byncrasies  were  of  a  totally  different  sort :  still  less  the  early  Christian 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  1.  377 

writers,  in  whom  nothing  is  more  evident  than  that  the  good  which 
was  in  them  was  all  derived,  as  they  always  professed  that  it  was  de- 
rived, from  the  higher  source." — [John  Stuart  Mill:  "Essays  on  Re- 
ligion"; New  York  ed.,  1874:  pp.  253-4. 

' '  Christ's  history  bears  all  the  marks  of  reality ;  a  more  frank,  sim- 
ple, unlabored,  unostentatious  narrative  was  never  penned.  Besides, 
his  character,  if  invented,  must  have  been  an  invention  of  singular 
difficulty,  because  no  models  existed  on  which  to  frame  it.  He  stands 
alone  in  the  records  of  time.  The  conception  of  a  being,  proposing 
such  new  and  exalted  ends,  and  governed  by  higher  principles  than 
the  progress  of  society  had  developed,  implies  singular  intellectual 
power.  That  several  individuals  should  join  in  equally  vivid  concep- 
tions of  this  character,  and  should  not  merely  describe  in  general 
terms  the  fictitious  being  to  whom  it  was  attributed,  but  should  intro- 
duce him  into  real  life,  should  place  him  in  a  great  variety  of  circum- 
stances, in  connexion  with  various  ranks  of  men,  with  friends  and 
foes,  and  should  in  all  preserve  his  identity,  show  the  same  great  and 
singular  mind  always  acting  in  harmony  with  itself :  this  is  a  supposi- 
tion hardly  credible ;  and,  when  the  circumstances  of  the  writers  of 
the  New  Testament  are  considered,  seems  to  be  as  inexplicable  on  hu- 
man principles  as,  what  I  have  suggested,  the  composition  of  Newton's 
'Principia'  by  a  savage." — [Dr.  Channing:  Works;  Boston  ed.,  1843: 
Vol.  3:  pp.  126-7. 

"  There  is  a  man  whose  tomb  is  guarded  by  love,  whose  sepulchre 
is  not  only  glorious,  as  a  prophet  declared,  but  whose  sepulchre  is 
loved.  There  is  a  man  whose  ashes,  after  eighteen  centuries,  have  not 
grown  cold,  who  daily  lives  again  in  the  thoughts  of  an  innumerable 
multitude  of  men ;  who  is  visited  in  his  cradle  by  shepherds  and  by 
kings,  who  vie  with  each  other  in  bringing  to  him  gold  and  frankin- 
cense and  myrrh.  There  is  a  man  whose  steps  are  unweariedly  refj-od- 
den  by  a  large  portion  of  mankind,  and  who,  although  no  longer 
present,  is  followed  by  that  throng  in  all  the  scenes  of  his  bygone  pil- 
grimage, upon  the  knees  of  his  mother,  by  the  borders  of  the  lakes,  ta 
the  tops  of  the  mountains,  in  the  by-ways  of  the  valleys,  under  the 
shade  of  the  olive  trees,  in  the  still  solitude  of  the  deserts.  .  .  The 
greatest  monuments  of  art  shelter  his  sacred  images ;  the  most  magnif- 
icent ceremonies  assemble  the  people  under  the  influence  of  his  name ; 
poetry,  music,  painting,  sculpture,  exhaust  their  resources  to  proclaim 
his  glory,  and  to  offer  him  incense  worthy  of  the  adoration  which  ages 
have  consecrated  to  him.  And  yet  upon  what  throne  do  they  adore 
him  ?  Upon  a  Cross  1 " — [Pere  Lacordaire:  Conferences;  London  ed., 
1869:  pp.  82-3,  86-7. 

XXV. :  p.  27.— "  Let  us  see  what  other  nations  have  had  and  still  havfr 


578  APPENDIX. 

in  the  place  of  religion :  let  us  examine  the  prayers,  the  worship,  the 
theology,  even,  of  the  most  highly  civilized  races  —  the  Greeks,  tha 
Romans,  the  Hindus,  the  Persians  —  and  we  shall  then  understand 
more  thorouglily  what  blessings  are  vouchsafed  to  us  in  being  allowed 
to  breathe  from  the  first  breath  of  life  the  pure  air  of  a  land  of  Chris- 
tian light  and  knowledge.  .  .  We  have  done  so  little  to  gain  our  re- 
ligion, we  have  suffered  so  little  in  the  cause  of  truth,  that  however 
highly  we  prize  our  own  Christianity,  we  never  prize  it  highly  enough 
until  we  have  compared  it  with  the  religions  of  the  rest  of  the  world.  .  . 
No  one  who  has  not  examined  patiently  and  honestly  the  other  relig- 
ions of  the  w^orld,  can  know  what  Christianity  really  is,  or  can  join 
with  such  truth  and  sincerity  in  the  words  of  St.  Paul:  'I  am  not 
ashamed  of  the  Gospel  of  Christ.'" — Max  Miiller  :  "Chips  from  Ger- 
man Workshop";  Nev/  York  ed.,  1881  :  Vol.  1:  pp.  180-1;  48. 

XXVI. :  p.  28. — "Nothing  can  well  be  more  arbitrary  than  to  stroll 
through  some  fifteen  centuries,  and,  gathering  up  none  but  the  most 
picturesque  and  beneficent  phenomena,  weave  them  into  a  glory  to 
cro\vn  the  faith  with  which  they  co-exist.  In  Christendom,  all  the 
great  and  good  things  that  are  done  at  all  will  of  course  be  done  by 
Christians,  and  will  contam  such  share  of  the  rehgious  element  as  may 
belong  to  the  character  of  the  actor  or  the  age ;  but  before  you  can 
avail  yourself  of  them  in  Christian  Apologetics,  it  must  be  shown  that, 
under  any  other  faith,  no  social  causes  would  have  remained  adequate 
either  to  produce  them,  or  to  provide  any  worthy  equivalent.  .  .  Every 
one  is  sensible  of  a  change  in  the  whole  climate  of  thought  and  feeling, 
the  moment  he  crosses  any  part  of  the  boundary  which  divides  Chris- 
tian civilization  from  Heathendom :  yet  of  nothing  is  it  more  difficult 
to  render  any  compendious  account." — [James  Martineau  :  "Studies 
of  ChiHstianity";  Boston  ed.,  1866:  pp.  300-301,  305. 

"  I  have  said,  again  and  again,  that  I  do  not  thiuli  we  prove  our  confi- 
dence iu  the  divinity  of  that  which  we  confess  by  subjecting  it  to  light 
tests,  by  arguing  that  this  or  that  is  not  justly  required  of  it.  What- 
ever has  been  found  necessary,  in  the  course  of  six  thousand  years'  ex- 
perience, we  have  a  right  to  ask  of  that  which  offei-s  itself  as  the  faith 
for  mankind.  And  I  do  not  beheve  that  it  ever  has  shrunk,  or  ever 
%vill  shrink,  from  any  demand  of  this  kind  that  we  make  upon  it."— 
[F.  D.  Maurice  :  "Eeligions  of  World";  London  ed.,  1877:  p.  166. 

XXVII. :  p.  28. — The  maxim  of  Coleridge  referred  to  is  correct  and 
important,  but  it  certainly  in  no  degree  excludes  or  limits  a  readinesa 
to  receive  Christianity  as  Divine  if  the  Truth  shall  demand  it : — 

"He  who  begins  by  loving  Christianity  better  than  Truth,  will  pro- 
ceed by  loving  his  own  sect  or  church  better  than  Christianity,  and 
end  in  loving  himself  better  than  all." — ["Mor.  and  Rel.  Aphorisms"; 
XXV.     Works  ;  New  York  ed.,  1853  :  Vol.  1  :  p.  173. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  I.  879 

XXVIII. :  p.  28. — "The  only  grand  and  world-histoiical  interest  of 
the  people  [of  Israel]  lies  in  this :  that  as  a  whole,  or  as  a  People  in  the 
strictest  sense  of  the  word,  once,  and  in  fact  immediately  at  the  verj^ 
beginning  of  its  independent  life,  it  entered  actively  and  wiUinglj 
into  the  highest  requirements  of  religion ;  indeed  that  it  sought  sim- 
ply through  this  its  final  aim,  with  all  self-sacrifice,  and  determined  to 
be  and  to  continue  a  truly  free  people  on  the  earth :  whereas  among 
other  peoples,  especially  the  Indian,  individuals  indeed  sought  to  know 
the  truths  of  religion,  a  few  even  to  realize  those  truths  in  their  life,  but 
no  single  genuine  Community  had  shaped  itself  by  a  pure  religion. 
But  now  as  religion  is  vastly  more  for  a  whole  people,  and  for  the 
world,  than  it  is  for  the  individual,  it  results  that  only  through  an  ap- 
propriate Community  can  it  perfect  itself  to  the  highest  measure." — 
[Ewald:  "Geschichte  des  Volkes  Israel":  Gottingen,  1865:  Band 
n. :  S.  241. 

XXIX. :  p.  29. — "  So  also  the  word  with  which  the  founder  of  Chris- 
tianity began  his  preaching  of  the  Gospel — that  the  followei'S  of  his 
doctrine  are  not  only  the  poor  in  spirit,  to  whom  belongs  the  king- 
dom of  Heaven,  but  also  the  meek,  who  shall  inherit  the  Earth — was 
brought  to  fulfilment,  even  in  this  sense,  in  the  extei^nal  history  of 
Christianity,  in  that  course  of  its  first  three  centuries  which  con- 
cerns the  world's  history.  .  .  Only  to  its  own  principle,  as  the  interior 
effectual  power,  can  Christianity  be  indebted  for  all  which  it  has  out- 
wardly become  in  the  progress  of  time;  and  the  greater  the  effects 
which  have  proceeded  from  this  principle,  the  more  certain  becomes 
the  attestation  thus  given  of  the  divinity  of  its  origin.  .  .  Christianity 
itself  describes  that  which  it  purposes  to  accomplish  in  man,  the  sub- 
stance of  the  change  which  shall  be  fully  effected  through  it,  as  a 
regeneration  and  renewal  of  the  whole  man:  so  as  such  a  power  trans- 
forming man  it  has  to  attest  itself  historically  through  the  moral  re- 
generation brought  about  by  it  in  the  public  life  of  mankind.  But 
this  is  certainly  that  which  gives  its  weightiest  significance  to  the 
period  of  the  first  three  centuries  of  Christianity,  when  we  regard  it 
from  the  most  universal  point  of  view,  that  of  moral  and  religious 
consideration.  Let  us  fix  our  thought,  as  here  must  be  done,  not  on 
that  which  Christianity  wrought  in  separate  individuals,  in  the  hidden 
deeps  of  their  inner  life,  but  on  its  effects  in  the  larger  contemplation: 
on  what  came  from  it  in  the  common  public  life  of  Nations,  as  the 
noblest  fruit  of  its  efficacious  activity.  So  with  all  justice  may  it  be 
said  that  the  world,  through  Christianity,  if  only  in  the  bounded 
circles  over  which  its  influence  could  directly  extend,  actually  became 
a  morally  purer  and  better  world.  This  shows  itself,  as  in  the  nature 
of  the  case  could  not  be  otherwise,  as  an  undeniable  historical  fact, 
at  all  the  points  at  which  Christianity  came  into  closest  and  mos> 


380  APPENDIX. 

immediate  contact  with  the  dominant  moral  corruption  of  the  heathen 
world."— [F.  C.  Bam*:  "Geschichte  der  Christ.  Kirche":  Ttibingca: 
1863:  Band  I.;  S.  473,  f. 

XXX. :  p.  29. — In  a  note  to  the  Introduction  by  Savigny  to  his  System 
of  Modern  Roman  Law,  he  gives  modest  expression  to  the  spirit  which 
had  animated  him  in  his  great  work.  Quoting  from  the  Lebensnachr 
richten  ilher  Niehuhr :  *  Above  all  things,  in  the  study  of  the  sciences, 
we  must  preserve  our  truthftdness  without  spot,  absolutely  shunning 
every  false  appearance,  writing  down  as  certain  not  the  smallest  mat- 
ter as  to  which  we  are  not  fully  persuaded,  and,  when  we  have  to  state 
conjectures  or  probabilities,  using  every  effort  to  show  the  degree  of 
our  persuasion' — ^he  adds,  "much  in  the  admirable  letter  from  which 
this  passage  is  taken  belongs  not  merely  to  philology,  to  which  it  im- 
mediately relates,  but  to  science  in  general." — ["Private  International 
Law":  Edinburgh  ed.,  1880:  p.  23. 

It  certainly  applies,  as  distinctly  as  to  any  student  in  the  world,  to 
one  who  would  illustrate  the  historical  indications  of  the  Divine  au- 
thorship of  Christianity. 

XXXI. :  p.  29. — "The  whole  tendency  of  thought  in  modern  times  is 
to  require  evidence  in  religious  matters  on  which  men  can  exercise 
some  judgment  of  their  own.  Scientific  judgments  are  in  numerous 
cases  accepted  without  this,  because  many  of  them  admit  of  verification 
in  our  actual  experience,  which  imparts  a  credibility  to  the  assertions 
of  eminent  professors  on  subjects  which  lie  beyond  its  range ;  but  the 
case  is  wholly  different  with  respect  to  religious  truth." — [C.  A.  Rowe: 
"Bampton  Lect.":  London  ed.,  1877:  p.  277  (note). 

XXXII. :  p.  30. — "There  are  very  few  persons  with  whom  the  ficti- 
tious character  of  fairy  tales  has  not  ceased  to  be  a  question,  or  who 
would  hesitate  to  disbelieve  or  even  to  ridicule  any  anecdote  of  this 
nature  which  was  told  them,  without  the  very  smallest  examination 
of  its  evidence.  Yet,  if  we  ask  in  what  respect  the  existence  of  fairies 
is  naturally  contradictory  or  absurd,  it  would  be  difficult  to  answer 
the  question.  .  .  That  such  beings  should  exist,  or  that,  existing, 
they  should  be  able  to  do  many  things  beyond  human  power,  are 
propositions  which  do  not  present  the  smallest  difiiculty.  For  many 
centuries  their  existence  was  almost  universally  believed.  .  .  When 
men  are  destitute  of  critical  spirit,  when  the  notion  of  uniform  law  is 
yet  unborn,  and  when  their  imaginations  are  still  incapable  of  rising 
to  abstract  ideas,  histories  of  miracles  are  always  formed  and  always 
believed,  and  they  continue  to  flourish  and  to  multiply  until  these 
conditions  have  altered." — [Lecky:  "History  of  European  Morals"; 
N.  York  ed. ,  1876 :  Vol.  1 :  pp.  370,  373. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II. 

Note  I. :  page  37. — "  Whether  the  etymology  which  the  ancients 
'gave  of  the  Greek  word  avdpuTrog,  man,  be  true  or  not,  (they  derived  it 
from  0  avu  aOpcjv^  he  who  looks  upward) :  certain  it  is  that  what  makes 
man  to  be  man,  is  that  he  alone  can  turn  his  face  to  heaven :  certain 
it  is  that  he  alone  yearns  for  something  that  neither  sense  nor  reason 
can  supply." — [Max  MuUer:  "Science  of  Religion";  New  York  ed., 
1872:  p.  12. 

"If  you  will  take  the  pains  to  travel  through  the  world,  you  may 
find  towns  and  cities  without  walls,  without  letters,  without  kings, 
without  houses,  without  wealth,  without  money,  without  theatres  and 
places  of  exercise ;  but  there  never  was  seen,  nor  shall  be  seen  by  man, 
any  city  v^ithout  temi)les  and  Gods,  or  without  making  use  of  prayers, 
oaths,  divinations,  and  sacrifices,  for  the  obtaining  of  blessings  and 
benefits,  and  the  averting  of  curses  and  calamities.  Nay,  I  am  of  opin- 
ion that  a  city  might  sooner  be  built  without  any  ground  to  fix  it  on, 
than  a  commonweal  be  constituted  altogether  void  of  any  religion 
and  opinion  of  the  Gods,  or  being  constituted  be  preserved." — [Plu- 
tarch:   adv.  Colotes:  31.  "Morals";  Boston  ed.,  1874:  Vol.  5:  p.  379. 

II. :  p.  38. — "Not  much  more  absurd  are  those  things  which  do  mis- 
chief by  the  melody  of  their  utterance,  as  poured  forth  in  the  words  of 
the  poets,  who  have  represented  the  gods  as  inflamed  with  anger,  rag- 
ing with  lust ;  who  have  made  us  see  their  wars,  battles,  combats, 
wounds  ;  even  further  than  this,  their  hatreds,  dissensions,  discords, 
births,  deaths,  complaints,  lamentations,  their  lusts  expressed  in  all  in- 
temperate ways,  their  adulteries,  chains,  their  sexual  intercourse  with 
mortals,  and  mortals  begotten  by  the  immortals." — [Cicero:  Nat.  Deor. : 
I. :  16. 

' '  Thence  also  comes  the  madness  of  the  poets,  nourishing  men's  er- 
rors with  fables,  by  whom  it  is  made  to  appear  that  Jupiter,  being  cap* 
tivated  with  the  voluptuous  pleasure  of  his  adulterous  embraces,  doub- 
led the  length  of  the  night.  What  else  is  it  but  to  add  fuel  to  oui 
wickedness  to  write  down  the  gods  as  the  authors  of  such  things,  and 
to  give  a  permitted  license  to  our  inward  distemper  by  the  example  oi 
divinity." — [Seneca:  Brev.  Vit. :  XVI. 

(381) 


382  APPENDIX. 

III. :  p.  38. — "Every  woman  born  in  the  [Babylonian]  countiy  must 
once  in  her  life  go  and  sit  down  in  the  precinct  of  Venus,  and  there 
consort  with  a  stranger.  Many  of  the  wealthier  sort,  who  are  too 
proud  to  mix  with  the  others,  drive  in  covered  carriages  to  the  pre- 
cinct, followed  by  a  goodly  train  of  attendants,  and  there  take  their 
station.  But  the  larger  nimiber  seat  themselves  within  the  holy  en- 
closure with  wreaths  of  string  about  their  heads — and  here  there  is 
always  a  great  crowd,  some  coming,  and  others  going :  lines  of  cord 
mark  out  paths  in  all  directions  among  the  women,  and  the  strangers 
pass  along  them  to  make  their  choice.  .  .  A  custom  very  much  hke 
this  is  found  also  in  certain  parts  of  the  island  of  Cyprus." — [Herodo- 
tus: Hist.:  I.:  199. 

"To  Jupiter,  whom  they  preeminently  worship  [at  Thebes],  a  virgin 
of  the  most  distinguished  family,  and  of  the  greatest  beauty,  is  conse- 
crated— such  as  the  G-reeks  call  Pallakes,  concubines.  She,  after  the 
fashion  of  a  concubine,  prostitutes  herself  with  whomsoever  she  will. 
.  .  She  is  afterward  given  in  marriage ;  but  before  she  is  married,  and 
after  the  time  of  prostitution,  she  is  mourned  for  according  to  the 
usage  for  the  dead."— [Strabo:  Rer.  Geog. :  xvii. :  1:  §  46  (Oxford  ed., 
1807:  n.:  1156).     See  also  Herodotus :  I.:  183. 

rV. :  p.  38. — "There  are  likewise  some  among  this  number  of  gods 
who  rejoice  in  victims,  or  ceremonies,  or  observances,  nocturnal  or 
diurnal,  public  or  performed  in  secret,  replete  with  the  greatest  joy, 
or  marked  with  extreme  sadness.  Thus,  the  Egyptian  deities  are  al- 
most all  of  them  delighted  with  lamentations,  the  Grecian  in  general 
with  dances,  and  those  of  the  Barbarians  with  the  sound  produced  by 
cymbals,  tambourines,  and  pipes." — [Apuleius:  "Daemon  of  Socrates." 

V. :  p.  38. — "And  the  temple  of  Venus  at  Corinth  was  so  rich  that 
it  had  more  than  a  thousand  courtesans  as  servants  of  the  sacred  rites, 
whom  both  men  and  women  had  dedicated  to  the  Goddess.  On  ac- 
count of  these  women,  therefore,  both  a  great  multitude  of  men  was 
congregated  in  the  city,  and  its  riches  became  what  they  were.  Ship- 
masters freely  squandered  their  money ;  whence  came  the  proverb,  '  It 
is  not  every  man's  voyage  which  leads  to  Corinth.'" — [Strabo  :  Rer. 
Geog. :  VIII. :  6:  §  20  (Oxford  ed.,  1807:  I. :  549). 

"  It  is  an  ancient  custom  at  Corinth  (as  Cliamaeleon  of  Heraclea  re- 
lates, in  his  treatise  on  Pindar),  whenever  the  city  addresses  any  sup- 
Y>lication  to  Venus  about  any  important  matter,  to  employ  as  many 
courtesans  as  possible  to  join  in  the  supplication ;  and  they,  too,  pray 
to  the  goddess,  and  afterwards  are  present  at  the  sacrifices.  And 
when  the  King  of  Pei'sia  was  leadinsr  his  army  against  Greece  (as 
Tlieopampus  also  relates,  and  so  does  Timaeus,  in  his  seventh  book), 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  383 

Ihe  Corinthian  courtesans  offered  prayers  for  the  safety  of  Greece, 
going"  to  the  temple  of  Venus.  .  .  And  even  private  individuals  some- 
times vow  to  Venus,  that  if  they  succeed  in  the  objects  for  which  they 
are  offering  their  vows,  they  will  bring  her  a  stated  number  of  courte- 
tians." — [Athenaeus:  "  Deipnosophistae  " :  XIII.:  32. 

VI. :  p.  38. — "The  people  of  her  neighbourhood,  having  had  a  statue 
made  of  Phryne  herself,  of  solid  gold,  consecrated  it  in  the  temple  of 
Delphi,  having  had  it  placed  on  a  pillar  of  Pentelican  marble ;  and  the 
statue  was  made  by  Praxiteles.  And  when  Crates  the  Cynic  saw  it,  he 
called  it  '  a  votive  offering  of  the  profligacy  of  Greece. '  .  .  And  Alexis 
the  Samian  says  :  '  The  Athenian  pi'ostitutes  who  followed  Pericles 
when  he  laid  siege  to  Samos,  having  raade  vast  sums  of  money  by  their 
beauty,  dedicated  a  statue  of  Venus  at  Samos,  which  some  call  Venus 
among  the  Eeeds.' " — [Athenaeus  :  "Deipnosophistae":  XIII. :  59,  31. 

Vn. :  p.  38. — One  having  occasion  to  make  himself  familiar  with 
that  vast  department  of  historical  study  in  which  the  leamiug  and  tal- 
ent of  Gibbon  were  splendidly  used,  will  do  well  to  bear  m.  mind  the 
portrait  of  him  by  Dr.  Martineau,  which  is  as  just  and  discriminatuig 
as  it  is  unsparing : — 

"His  whole  spirit  was  unsocial  and  irreverent;  his  affections  never 
deep  in  the  sorrows,  his  moral  sense  not  revolted  by  the  sins,  of  the  be- 
ings he  presents  on  his  magnificent  stage ;  his  imagination  resting  on 
the  pageantry,  the  scenery,  the  mechanism,  the  dress,  the  evolutions  of 
national  existence,  but  not  penetrating  to  its  real  life  ;  and  his  Epicu- 
rean cast  of  character  wholly  disqualifying  him  for  any  appreciation  of 
the  genius  and  agency  of  Christianity." — ["Miscellanies";  Boston  ed., 
1852  :  p.  93. 

Mr.  Lecky  has  written  words  as  discerning  and  just: — 

"The  complete  absence  of  all  sympathy  with  the  heroic  courage 
manifested  by  the  martyrs,  and  the  frigid,  and  in  truth  most  unphilo- 
sophical  severity,  with  which  the  historian  has  weighed  the  words  and 
actions  of  men  engaged  in  the  agonies  of  a  deadly  struggle,  must  repel 
every  generous  nature ;  while  the  persistence  with  which  he  estimates 
persecutions  by  the  number  of  deaths  rather  than  by  the  amount  of 
suffen'ng,  diverts  the  mind  from  the  really  distiactive  atrocities  of 
the  Pagan  persecutions." — ["Hist,  of  European  Morals";  New  York 
ed.,  1876  :  Vol.  1  :  p.  494. 

VIII. :  p.  39. — "  Numa  forbade  the  Romans  to  represent  God  in  the 
form  of  man  or  beast,  nor  was  there  any  painted  or  graven  image  of  a 
deity  admitted  amongst  them  for  the  space  of  the  first  hundred  and  sev- 
enty years ;  all  which  time  their  temples  and  chapels  were  kept  free 


381  APPENDIX. 

and  pure  from  images:  to  such  baser  objects  they  deemed  it  impious  to 
liken  the  highest,  and  all  a<jcess  to  God  impossible,  except  by  the  pure 
act  of  the  intellect."— [Plutarch:  "Lives";  Boston  ed.,  1859  :  Vol.  1.; 
p.  138. 

IX.:  p.  39. — "Her  temples  [Flora's]  are  entirely  surrounded  with 
wreaths  of  flowers  stitched  together ;  and  the  splendid  table  is  bidder 
beneath  roses  showered  upon  it.  The  drunken  reveler  dances  witb^ 
liis  hair  crowned  with  chaplets  of  the  linden- tree  bark,  and  unawares 
is  mastered  by  the  witchery  of  the  wine.  Drunken  he  sings  at  the  re- 
pellent threshold  of  his  beautiful  mistress ;  his  perfumed  locks  sus- 
tain delicate  garlands.  .  .  The  reason  why  the  harlot-crowd  should 
resort  in  gi'eat  numbers  to  these  games,  when  sought,  is  found  without 
trouble.  She  [the  Goddess]  is  none  of  the  severe  ones,  nor  is  she 
great  in  the  matter  of  high  professions :  she  wishes  that  her  sacred  cer- 
emonies should  be  open  to  the  plebeian  multitude.  And  she  admonishes 
us  to  use  the  beauty  of  our  youth,  while  it  is  blooming;  that  the  thorn 
is  to  be  disdained,  when  the  roses  have  fallen." — [Ovid:  Fastor.  L.  V. : 
335-340,  349-354. 

' '  The  secrets  of  Bona  Dea  are  notorious.  When  the  pipe  wantonly 
excites  them,  and  frantic  alike  with  the  horn  and  with  wine  these 
Maenads  of  Priapus  rush  about,  and  whirl  their  hair,  and  howl:  oh, 
how  gi'eat  is  then  the  licentious  longing  of  their  minds !  what  an  ut- 
terance is  theirs  in  their  lascivious  dance !  .  .  Nothing  is  counterfeited 
in  this  sort  of  sport ;  all  things  are  done  to  the  life,  so  that  the  very  son 
of  Laomedon  [Priam],  frigid  with  years,  might  be  inflamed,  and 
Nestor  himself.  Then  their  fierce  lust  brooks  no  delay,  then  the  wo- 
man appears  without  disguise :  and  by  all  alike  is  the  shout  resounded 
in  the  den,  etc.,  etc.  .  .  Would  that  our  ancient  rites  and  jjublic 
worship  might  at  least  be  celebrated  unstained  by  iniquities  like 
these."— [Juvenal  :  Sat.  VI.:  314-336. 

X. :  p.  39. — "How  great  in  our  time  is  the  madness  of  men !  They 
whisper  to  the  gods  most  villainous  prayers ;  if  any  one  turns  an  eai 
toward  them,  they  are  dumb ;  but  what  they  are  unwilling  that  man 
should  know  they  set  forth  in  words  to  God.  See  then  if  this  may  not 
profitably  be  made  our  precept :  '  So  live  with  men  as  if  God  saw  thee , 
so  speak  with  God  as  if  men  should  hear  thee.' " — [Seneca,  Epist.  x. 

"If  any  one  has  time  to  see  the  things  which  they  do,  and  the  things 
which  they  suffer  [those  who  would  propitiate  the  gods],  he  will  find 
so  many  things  unseemly  for  men  of  respectability,  so  unworthy  of 
freemen,  so  unlike  the  doings  of  sane  men,  that  no  one  would  doubt 
that  they  were  mad,  had  they  been  mad  with  the  minoiity;  but  now 


J^OTBS  TO  LECTURE  II.  385 

(the  multitude  of  the  insane  is  the  defence  of  their  sanity." — [Seneca  * 
■quoted  by  Au^stine :  Civ.  Dei.  VI.  10. 

XI.:  p.  39. — "As  to  what  had  reference  to  the  gods  he  [Socrates] 
^evidently  acted  and  spoke  in  conformity  with  the  answer  which  the 
priestess  of  Apollo  gives  to  those  who  inquire  how  they  ought  to  pro- 
ceed with  regard  to  a  sacrifice,  to  the  worship  of  their  ancestors,  or  to 
any  such  matter;  for  the  priestess  replies  that  'they  will  act  pioiisly 
if  they  act  in  agreement  with  the  law  of  their  own  countiy';  and 
Socrates  both  acted  in  this  manner  himself,  and  exhorted  others  to  act 
similarly. " — [Xenophon :  Memor.  I. :  3:1. 

XII. :  p.  39. — "You  have  gone  astray,  you  have  fallen  in  love,  you 
have  been  guilty  of  some  adultery,  and  then  have  been  caught.  You 
are  undone,  for  you  are  unable  to  speak.  But  if  you  associate  with  me, 
indulge  your  inclination,  dance,  laugh,  and  think  nothing  disgraceful. 
For  if  you  should  happen  to  be  detected  as  an  adulterer,  you  will  make 
this  reply  to  him :  '  that  you  have  done  him  no  injury ' ;  and  then  refer 
him  to  Jupiter,  how  even  he  is  overcome  by  love  and  women,  and 
liow  could  you,  who  are  a  mortal,  have  greater  power  than  a  god  ? " — 
i Aristophanes:  "Clouds":  1077-82. 

"  And  this  further  I  would  say  to  you:  why  are  you,  being  a  Greek, 
Indignant  at  your  son  when  he  imitates  Jupiter,  and  rises  against  you, 
and  defrauds  you  of  your  own  wife  ?  Why  do  you  count  him  your 
enemy,  and  yet  worship  one  who  is  like  him  ?  and  why  do  you  blame 
your  wife  for  living  in  unchastity,  and  yet  honor  Venus  with  shrines  ? 
If  indeed  these  things  had  been  related  by  others,  they  would  have 
seemed  mere  slanderous  accusations,  and  not  truth.  But  now  your 
owni  poets  sing  these  things,  and  your  histories  noisily  publish  them." 
— [Justin  Martyr :  Orat.  ad  Graec. :  iv. 

"Others  of  your  writers,  in  their  wantonness,  minister  to  your  pleas- 
ures by  vilifying  the  gods.  .  .  Your  dramatic  literature,  too,  depicts 
all  the  vileness  of  your  gods.  .  .  This,  it  will  be  said  however,  is  all 
in  sport.  But  if  I  add— what  all  know,  and  will  readily  admit  to  be 
the  fact — that  in  the  temples  adulteries  are  arranged,  that  at  the  altars 
pimpmg  is  practised,  that  often  in  the  houses  of  the  temple-keepers  and 
priests,  under  the  sacrificial  fillets,  and  the  sacred  hats,  and  the  purple 
rol:>es,  amid  the  fumes  of  incense,  deeds  of  licentiousness  are  done,  I 
am  not  sure  but  your  gods  have  more  reason  to  complain  of  you  than 
of  Christians." — [Tertullian:  Apolog.,  c.  15. 

XIII. :  p.  39. — "  In  regard  to  the  Gods,  and  to  all  matters  of  religion, 
lie  [Tiberius]  waa  very  careless ;  especially  as  being  himself  addicted  ta 
25 


386  APPENDIX, 

astrology,  and  fully  persuaded  that  all  things  are  governed  by  Fatei 
Yet  he  was  afraid  beyond  measure  of  thunder ;  and  whenever  the  skj 
was  disturbed  he  never  failed  to  wear  on  his  head  a  laurel-crown,  be* 
cause  it  was  denied  that  that  kind  of  leaf  is  ever  touched  by  the  light- 
ning."— [Suetonius:  Tiberius:  LXix.  Pliny  mentions  the  same  things 
in  the  Nat.  Hist. :  XV.  40. 

XIV.:  p.  40.— "Whatever  God  is,  if  he  is  at  all  other  [than  the 
Sun],  and  in  what  place  soever  he  exists,  he  is  all  sense,  all  sight,  all 
hearing,  all  life,  all  mind,  and  all  contained  within  himself.  .  .  But 
it  is  ridiculous  to  suppose  that  this  supreme,  whatever  it  is,  exercises 
any  care  over  human  affairs.  Can  we  believe,  or  rather  can  we  doubt 
about  the  matter,  that  it  would  not  be  dishonored  by  such  a  sad  and 
complicated  office  ?  Scarcely  is  it  easy  to  decide  which  opinion  may 
the  more  conduce  to  the  advantage  of  mankind,  since  while  by  some 
no  God  is  regarded,  by  others  he  is  shamefully  worshipped.  .  .  An- 
v:)ther  set  of  people  reject  this  principle  [that  Fortune  rules  all],  and  as- 
sign events  to  the  power  of  the  stars,  and  the  laws  of  one's  nativity. 
.  .  This  opinion  begins  to  get  itself  established,  and  the  learned  and 
the  rude  rabble  alike  are  rushing  into  it.  .  .  Such  things  as  these  so 
envelope  the  humanity  which  has  no  foresight  that  in  the  midst  of 
them  this  is  the  only  certainty,  that  nothing  is  certain ;  nor  anything 
else  more  wretched  than  man,  or  at  the  same  time  more  proud.  .  . 
He  [the  deity]  cannot  compass  his  own  death,  even  if  he  wished  it — 
that  which  he  gives  to  man  as  the  best  boon  in  the  midst  of  such  man 
if  old  pains  of  life."— [Pliny :  Nat.  Hist. ;  II. :  5. 

XV. :  p.  40. — "Even  Varro  himself  has  chosen  rather  to  doubt  con- 
cerning all  things,  than  to  affinn  anything  [about  the  gods].  .  .  This 
same  Varro,  then,  still  speaking  by  anticipation,  says  that  he  thinks 
that  God  is  the  soul  of  the  world,  and  that  this  world  itself  is  God ; 
but,  as  a  wise  man,  though  he  consists  of  body  and  mind,  is  neverti^e- 
less  called  wise  on  account  of  his  mind,  so  the  world  is  called  God  on 
account  of  mind,  although  it  consists  of  mind  and  body."— [Augustine* 
Civ.  Dei;  VII.:  17,  6. 

"Whence,  with  respect  to  these  sacred  rites  of  the  civil  theology, 
Seneca  preferred,  as  the  best  course  to  be  followed  by  a  wise  man,  to 
feign  respect  for  them  in  act,  but  to  have  no  real  regard  for  them  at 
heart.  'All  which  thmgs,'  he  says,  ' a  wise  man  will  observe  as  bemg 
commanded  by  the  laws,  but  not  as  being  pleasing  to  the  gods.'  . 
*AU  this  ignoble  crowd  of  gods  which  the  superstition  of  ages  has 
amassed,  we  ought  to  adore  in  such  a  way  as  to  remember  all  the 
wliile  that  its  worship  belongs  rather  to  custom  than  to  reality.'  .   ► 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  387 

But  this  man,  whom  philosophy  had  made  as  it  were  free,  nevei'the* 
less,  because  he  was  an  illustrious  senator  of  the  Roman  people,  wor- 
shipped what  he  censured,  did  what  he  condemned,  adored  what  he 
reproached, "  etc. — [Augustine :  Civ.  Dei :  VI. :  10. 

XVI.:  p.  40. — "I  shall  commence  to  discuss  with  thee  [Memmius] 
concerning  the  complete  explanation  of  the  heaven,  and  of  the  gods, 
and  shall  unfold  to  thee  the  primordial  elements  of  things ;  from  which 
Nature  produces,  builds  up,  and  nourishes  things  in  all  departments  : 
into  which  the  same  Nature  again  resolves  them  when  they  are  de- 
stroyed ; — these  elements  when  presented  in  the  way  of  explanation  we 
are  wont  to  call  matter,  and  the  generative  bodies  of  things,  and  to 
name  them  the  seeds  of  things,  and  to  assume  them  as  primal  bodies, 
because  from  them  as  original  all  things  have  existence. " — [Lucretius : 
Rer.  Nat. :  I. :  49-56. 

' '  What  is  this  [Christian]  superstition  ?  Man,  and  every  animal 
which  is  bom,  inspired  with  life,  and  nourished,  is  as  a  voluntary 
concretion  of  the  elements,  into  which  again  every  man  and  every  ani- 
mal is  divided,  resolved,  and  dissipated ;  so  all  things  flow  back  again 
into  their  source,  and  are  turned  again  into  themselves,  without  any 
artificer,  or  judge,  or  creator." — [Caecilius :  in  "Octavius"  of  Minu- 
cius  Felix :  v. 

XVII. :  p.  40.— "Wilt  thou  call  him  Fate  ?  thou  shalt  not  err.  .  . 
Wilt  thou  name  him  Providence  ?  Thou  sayest  rightly.  .  .  Wilt 
thou  call  him  Nature  ?  Thou  shalt  not  sin.  .  .  Wilt  thou  call  him 
the  World  ?  Thou  shalt  not  be  deceived.  For  he  is  all  that  which 
thou  seest,  wholly  infused  into  his  various  parts,  and  sustaining  him- 
self by  his  own  energy." — [Seneca:  Natur,  Qusest. :  II. :  45. 

"  For  what  else  is  Nature  than  God,  and  a  divine  reason  intermixed 
with  the  whole  world,  and  with  all  its  parts  ?  .  .  Thou  accomplishest 
nothing  then,  most  ungrateful  of  mortals,  when  thou  deniest  that  thou 
art  indebted  to  God,  but  only  to  Nature ;  for  neither  is  Nature  without 
God,  nor  God  without  Nature ;  but  each  is  the  same  thing  with  the 
other,  and  there  is  no  difference  in  their  oflBce." — [De  Benef. :  IV. : 
7,8. 

"This  has  come  to  pass,  believe  me,  under  whomsoever  has  been 
the  fashioner  of  the  universe — whether  it  be  God,  powerful  over  all, 
or  incorporeal  reason,  the  skillful  artificer  of  gi-eat  works,  or  a  di\'ine 
spirit  diffused  with  an  equal  attentiveness  throughout  all  things  great- 
est or  smallest ;  or  whether  it  be  fate,  and  an  unchangeable  series  of 
causes,  interhnked  each  to  the  others — this,  I  say,  has  come  to  pass, 
that  only  the  meanest  things  happen  to  us  under  a  choice  foreign  to 
our  own.    .    .    The  world,  than  which  nothing  is  greater  or  more  'ilab* 


388  APPENDIX. 

orately  beautiful,  the  nature  of  things  has  produced." — [Consol.  ad 
Helv. :  vm. 

XVIII. :  p.  40. — "  Plato,  accordmgly,  having  learned  this  in  Egypt, 
and  being  greatly  taken  with  what  was  said  about  one  God,  did  ind(ied 
consider  it  unsafe  to  mention  the  name  of  Moses,  on  account  of  his 
teaching  the  doctrine  of  one  only  God,  for  he  dreaded  the  Areopagus ; 
but  what  is  very  well  expressed  by  him  in  his  elaborate  treatise,  the 
Timaeus,  he  has  written  in  exact  correspondence  with  what  Moses  said 
concerning  God,  though  he  has  done  so,  not  as  if  he  had  learned  it 
from  him,  but  as  if  expressing  his  own  opinion." — [Justin  Martyr : 
Cohor.  ad  Graec. :  xxii. 

XIX. :  p.  40. — "I  shall  argue  that  to  speak  well  of  the  gods  to  men 
is  far  easier  than  to  speak  well  of  mortals  to  one  another  :  for  the  in- 
experience and  utter  ignorance  of  his  hearers  about  such  mattere  is  a 
great  assistance  to  him  who  has  to  speak  of  them,  and  we  know  how 
ignorant  we  are  concerning  the  gods." — [Plato:  Critias:  107. 

"All  sensible  things,  which  are  apprehended  by  opinion  and  sense, 
are  in  process  of  creation,  and  created.  Now  that  which  is  created 
must  of  necessity  be  created  by  a  cause.  But  how  can  we  find  out 
the  Father  and  Maker  of  all  this  universe  ?  Or,  when  we  have  found 
Him,  how  shall  we  be  able  to  speak  of  Him  to  all  men  ? " — [Plato : 
Timaeus:  28. 

Origen's  comment  on  these  words,  when  quoted  by  Celsus,  is  surely 
a  just  one : — 

"  These  words  of  Plato  are  noble  and  admirable;  but  see  if  Scripture 
does  not  give  us  the  example  of  a  regard  for -mankind  still  greater  in 
God  the  Word,  who  'was  in  the  beginning  with  God,'  and  who  'was 
made  flesh,'  in  order  that  he  might  reveal  to  all  men  truths  which, 
according  to  Plato,  it  would  be  impossible  to  make  known  to  all  men 
after  he  had  found  them  himself." — [Origen:  adv.  Celsus:  vii. :  42. 

Compare  the  attitude  of  Heraclitus  toward  the  people : — 

"  The  mass  of  men  have  no  intelligence  for  eternal  truth,  though  it 
is  clear  and  obvious ;  .  .  the  order  of  the  world,  glorious  as  it  is,  for 
them  does  not  exist.  Truth  seems  to  them  incredible ;  they  are  deaf 
to  it,  even  when  it  reaches  their  ears ;  to  the  ass  chaff  is  preferable  to 
gold,  and  the  dog  barks  at  every  one  he  does  not  know.  Equally  in- 
capable of  hearing  and  speaking,  their  best  course  would  be  to  conceal 
their  ignorance.  Irrational  as  they  are,  they  abide  by  the  sayings  of 
the  poets,  and  the  opinions  of  the  multitude,  without  considering  that 
the  good  are  always  few  in  number;  etc." — [Zeller:  "Hist,  of  Greek 
Philosophy":  (Pre-Socratic) ;  London  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  2:  pp.  7-10. 

XX.:  p  40. — "For  Mosess,  one  of  the  Egyptian  priests,  who  had  a 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  11.  389 

certain  part  of  tliis  territory,  and  who  found  his  condition  there  irk 
some,  emigrated  thence,  with  many  companions,  who  had  a  zeal  for 
sacred  things.  He  affirmed  and  taught  that  the  Egyptians,  and  like- 
wise the  Africans,  did  not  judge  rightly,  who  ascribed  to  God  the 
likeness  of  Leasts  and  of  cattle,  nor  the  Greeks,  who  attributed  the 
figure  of  man  to  the  gods.  But  God  [according  to  him]  is  that  alone 
which  contams  us  all,  land  and  sea,  what  we  call  the  heaven,  the  uni- 
verse, and  the  nature  of  all  things;  whose  likeness  accordingly  no 
one  of  sane  mind  will  dare  to  picture  as  similar  to  any  of  these  things 
which  are  present  to  us.  So,  all  portraying  by  images  being  rejected, 
a  temple  and  a  sanctuary  worthy  of  Him  should  be  established,  and 
He  should  be  worshipped  without  any  representation." — [Strabo:  Rer. 
Geog. :  XVI:  2;  §  35  (Oxford  ed.,  1807:  H. :  1082). 

The  doctrine  of  Moses  is  obviously  conceived  by  Strabo  under  the 
forms  of  thought  familiar  to  the  Stoics. 

XXI. :  p.  41. — "With  the  adherents  of  the  Sankhya  doctrine,  Buddha 
believed  himself  to  have  ascertained  that  neither  the  gods  nor  a  su- 
preme all-pervading  world-soul  exists." — [Duncker:  "Hist,  of  Antiq- 
uity": Vol.  4:  p.  341. 

"As  he  [Buddha]  recognizes  not  a  god  upon  whom  man  depends, 
his  doctrine  is  absolutely  atheistic." — [Barth:  "Religions  of  India ";^ 
Boston  ed.,  1882:  p.  110. 

"These  speculations  are  peculiar  to  Buddhism;  and  although  they 
produce  contrivance  without  a  contriver,  and  design  without  a  de^ 
signer,  they  are  as  rational,  in  this  respect,  as  any  other  system  that 
denies  the  agency  of  a  self -existent  and  ever-Uving  God.  .  .  Inasmuch 
as  Buddhism  declares  Karma  to  be  the  supreme  controlling  power  of 
the  universe,  it  is  an  atheistic  system.  It  ignores  the  existence  of 
an  intelligent  and  personal  Deity." — [R.  Spence  Hardy:  "Manual  of 
Buddhism":  London  ed.,  1880:  p.  413. 

"I  will  mention  two  important  subjects  in  regard  to  which  there  is 
a  growing  conviction  in  my  mind  that  he  [Confucius]  came  short  of 
the  faith  of  the  older  sages.  The  first  is  the  doctrine  of  God.  .  .  Con- 
fucius preferred  to  speak  of  Heaven.  Instances  have  already  been 
given  of  this.  Two  others  may  be  cited.  .  .  Not  once  throughout 
the  Analects  does  he  use  the  personal  name.  I  would  say  that  he  was 
unreligious  rather  than  irreligious ;  yet  .  .  he  prepared  the  way  for 
the  speculations  of  the  literati  of  the  mediaeval  and  modern  times,  which 
have  exposed  them  to  the  charge  of  atheism." — [Legge:  "Chinese 
Cla.ssics";  London  ed.,  1861:  Vol.  1:  pp.  99-100. 

XXII.:  p.  41. — "On  one  side  there  is  a  bias  to  monotheism  run 
ning  through  it  [the  Roman  religion]  :  there  must  have  been  one  sin- 


390  APPENDIX. 

gle  nameless  god  in  existence  at  its  mysteriously  veiled  commen« ce- 
ment, who,  in  the  event,  turned  into  a  Jupiter  Optimus  Maximus,  bvil 
was  never  entirely  lost  to  the  conscience  of  the  Romans;  tlierefom 
they  continued,  even  till  late  times,  to  invoke  him  in  the  most  violent 
and  irresistible  of  natural  phenomena.  .  .  In  this  way  they  swelled 
the  number  of  the  gods  so  incalculably  that  the  generality  of  Romans 
were  far  from  being  acquainted  with  even  the  names  of  all  their  dei- 
ties ;  and  we,  too,  remain  in  ignorance  of  many  of  them,  including 
such  as  had  a  worship  of  their  own." — [Dollinger :  "The  Grentile 
and  the  Jew  " :  Vol.  2 :  pp.  13-14. 

*'  'It  is,  therefore,  more  than  five  thousand  years  since,  in  the  valley 
of  the  Nile,  the  hymn  began  to  the  Unity  of  God  and  the  immortality 
of  the  soul ;  and  we  find  Egypt  in  the  last  ages  arrived  at  the  most  un- 
bridled Polytheism.  The  belief  in  the  Unity  of  the  Supreme  God,  ant) 
in  his  attributes  as  Creator  and  Lawgiver  of  man,  whom  he  has  en 
do  wed  with  an  immortal  soul, — these  are  the  primitive  notions,  en- 
chased, like  indestructible  diamonds,  in  the  midst  of  the  mythological 
superf etations  accumulated  in  the  centuries  which  have  passed  over 
that  ancient  civilization'  [Emmanuel  Rouge].  .  .  It  is  mcontestably 
true  that  the  sublimer  portions  of  the  Egyptian  religion  are  not  the 
comparatively  late  result  of  a  process  of  development  or  elimination 
from  the  grosser.  The  sublimer  portions  are  demonstrably  ancient  : 
and  the  last  stage  of  the  Egyptian  religion,  that  known  to  the  Greek 
and  Latin  writers,  heathen  or  Christian,  was  by  far  the  grossest  and 
most  corrupt." — [Renouf  :  "  Religion  of  Ancient  Egypt":  New  York 
ed.,1880:  pp.  94-5. 

' '  We  have  accustomed  ourselves  to  regard  a  belief  in  the  unity  of 
God  as  one  of  the  last  stages  to  which  the  Greek  mind  ascended  from 
the  depths  of  a  polytheistic  faith.  .  .  But  how  can  we  tell  that  the 
course  of  thought  was  the  same  in  India  ?  By  what  right  do  we  mark 
all  hymns  as  modern,  in  which  the  idea  of  one  God  breaks  through 
the  clouds  of  a  polytheistic  phraseology?  The  belief  in  a  Supreme 
God,  in  a  God  above  all  gods,  may  in  the  abstract  seem  later  than  the 
belief  in  many  gods.  .  .  But  there  is  a  monotheism  that  precedes  the 
polytheism  of  the  Veda ;  and  even  in  the  invocations  of  their  innumer- 
able gods  this  remembrance  of  a  God,  one  and  infinite,  breaks  through 
the  mist  of  an  idolatrous  phraseology,  like  the  blue  sky  that  is  hidden 
by  passing  clouds." — [Max  Miiller:  "  Hist,  of  Ancient  Sanskrit  Litera- 
ture": London  ed.,  1859:  pp.  558-9. 

The  wonderfully  learned  and  elaborate  treatment  of  the  earl  3  mono- 
theism by  Cudworth,  in  his  fourth  chapter,  is  doubtless  familiar.  The 
thesis  which  he  maintains  is  this : — 

"  Wherefore  the  truth  of  this  whole  business  seems  to  be,  that  the 
ancient  Pagans  did  physiologize  in  their  theology :  and  whether  look 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IL  391 

ing  upon  the  whole  world  animated  as  the  Supreme  God,  and  conse- 
quently the  several  parts  of  it  as  his  living  members— or  else  appre- 
hending- it  at  least  to  be  a  mirror,  or  visible  image,  of  the  invisible 
Deity,  and  consequently  all  its  several  parts  but  so  many  several  man- 
ifestations of  the  Divine  power  and  providence — they  pretended  that 
all  their  devotion  towards  the  Deity  ought  not  to  be  huddled  up  in  one 
general  and  confused  acknowledgment  of  a  supreme  invisible  Being, 
the  creator  and  governor  of  all :  but  that  all  the  several  manifestations 
of  the  Deity  in  the  world  should  be  made  so  many  distinct  objects  of 
their  devout  veneration.  .  .  We  shall  afterward  make  it  appear,  that 
the  first  original  of  this  business  proceeded  from  a  certain  philosophic 
opinion  amongst  the  Pagans,  that  Grod  was  diffused  throughout  the 
whole  world,  and  was  himself  in  a  manner  in  all  things,  and  therefore 
ought  to  be  worshipped  in  all  things :  but  the  poets  were  principally 
the  men  who  carried  it  on  thus  far,  by  personating  the  several  inani- 
mate parts  of  the  world  and  things  of  nature,  to  make  such  a  multi- 
tude of  gods  and  goddesses  of  them.  .  .  We  have  now  dispatched  the 
first  of  those  three  heads,  viz.,  that  the  Pagans  worshipped  one  and  the 
same  Supreme  God,  under  many  personal  names,  so  that  much  of  their 
polytheism  was  but  seeming  and  fantastical,  and  indeed  nothing  but 
the  polyonomy  of  one  Supreme  God,  they  making  many  poetical  and 
political  gods  of  that  one  natural  God  :  and  thus  worshipping  God  by 
parts  and  piecemeal,  according  to  that  clear  acknowledgment  of  Max- 
imus  Madaurensis  before  cited." — ["Intellectual  System,  etc.";  Ando- 
vered.,  1837:  Vol.  1:  pp.  308,  475,  715. 

XXIII.:  p.  42. — "Formerly  I  was  a  fig-tree  trunk,  a  useless  log, 
when  the  workman,  undecided  whether  he  would  make  a  bench 
of  me  or  a  Priapus,  determined  that  I  should  be  a  God :  thenceforth 
I  became  a  God,  the  greatest  terror  of  thieves  and  birds ;  for  my  right 
hand  restrains  the  thieves,  .  .  but  lime-twigs  fixed  upon  my  head 
frighten  the  troublesome  birds,  and  forbid  them  to  alight  in  the  new 
gardens."— [Horace  :  Sat.  I. :  8  :  1-7. 

XXIV. :  p.  42. — "  But  not  yet  had  come  on  that  disregard  of  the  gods 
v\-hich  possesses  the  present  age :  nor  did  each  one  then,  by  his  own 
hiterpretation,  make  oaths  and  laws  conformable  to  his  purposes,  but, 
rather,  he  accommodated  to  them  his  own  customs  of  life." — [Livy: 
Histor. :  III. :  20. 

XXV. :  p.  42. — "And  then,  if  this  wall  be  raised,  [I  admonish  you' 
that  you  demand  back  the  empire  from  Jove ;  and  if  he  refuses,  and 
does  not  immediately  confess  himself  in  the  wrong,  that  you  declare 
a  sacred  war  against  him,  and  forbid  the  gods  to  pass  through  youi 


392  APPENDIX. 

district,  wlien  lecherous,  as  formerly  they  were  accustomed  to  ga 
down  to  debauch  their  Alcmenes,  their  Alopes,  and  their  Semeles.  .  . 
And  I  advise  you  to  send  another  bird  as  herald  to  men,  henceforth  ta 
sacrifice  to  the  birds,  since  the  birds  have  the  rule.  .  .  If  any  one  sac- 
rifice to  Venus,  let  him  offer  wheat  to  the  coot ;  and  if  any  one  sacrifice 
a  sheep  to  Neptune,  let  him  dedicate  wheat  to  the  duck;  and  if  any 
one  sacrifice  to  Hercules,  let  him  offer  honied  cakes  to  the  gull ;  and  il 
any  one  sacrifice  a  ram  to  king  Jove,  the  wren  is  the  king,  to  whom 
he  ought  to  slay  a  male  ant  before  Jove  himself." — [Aristophanes . 
''Birds":  554-70. 

XXVI. :  p.  42. — "As  Athens  far  surpassed  other  Hellenic  cities  in 
intellectual  matters,  so  too  her  mysteries,  the  Eleusinian,  had  the 
precedence  of  all  institutions  of  the  kind.  They  owed  this,  in  part,  to 
the  fame  of  Athens,  and  in  part  to  the  artistic  splendour  and  tasteful 
beauty  of  their  scenic  ornamentation,  and  in  some  degree  also  to  the  care 
the  Athenians  took  in  cherishing  the  behef  that  those  who  were  initiated 
there  acquired  the  securest  guarantee  of  bliss  in  the  other  world.  .  . 
The  Eleusinia  as  a  whole  formed  a  great  solemnity,  lasting  at  least  ten 
days,  when  much  passed  in  public,  before  all  eyes,  the  magnificence 
of  which  always  drew  to  Athens  a  crowd  of  people,  including  many 
who  had  no  desire  to  be  initiated.  Feast  and  mystery  were  treated  as 
an  institution  of  the  state,  and  therefore  were  undei:  the  direction  of 
the  republic." — [DoUinger  :  "The  Gentile  and  the  Jew";  Lond.  ed., 
1862  :  Vol.  1  :  pp.  176-7. 

"When,  at  the  celebration  of  the  greater  Eleusinian  mysteries,  the 
mysta3  marched  in  procession  to  Eleusis,  they  were  greeted  at  the 
bridge  over  the  Cephissus  with  all  sorts  of  jokes  and  gibes,  many  of 
them  exceedingly  coarse.  Even  at  the  chorus  dance  on  the  meadow 
near  Eleusis,  similar  sport  was  made." — [Uhlhom  :  '*  Conflict  of  Chris- 
tianity"; New  York  ed.,  1879  :  p.  161. 

XXVn. :  p.  42. — "That  there  are  any  departed  spirits,  and  subter- 
ranean realms,  and  the  pole  [of  Charon],  and  the  black  frogs  in  the 
Stygian  whirlpool,  and  that  so  many  thousand  souls  cross  that  water 
in  one  bark — not  even  boys  beheve,  unless  they  are  not  yet  old  enough 
to  be  charged  a  price  for  a  bath." — [Juvenal :  Sat.  II. :  149-152. 

"Dost  thou  not  know  what  a  laugh  thy  simplicity  would  excite 
among  the  common  folk,  if  thou  shouldst  expect  from  any  one  that  he 
would  not  perjure  himself,  but  would  really  think  that  some  deity  is 
present  in  any  of  the  temples,  and  at  the  altar  reddened  with  blood  ?'^ 
—[Sat.  XIII. :  34-37. 

"  But  seek  your  deputy-General  [0  Csesar]  in  some  vast  eating-house. 
You  will  find  hiTn  lying  down  with  any  mere  cut-throat;  intermixed 


NOTBS  TO  LECTURE  11.  393 

with  sailors,  thieves,  and  runaway  slaves ;  among  hangmen,  and  the 
makers  of  cheap  biers,  and  the  silent  drmns  of  the  priest  of  Cybele, 
now  prostrate  in  drunkenness."— [Sat.  VIII. :  172-176. 

Quintilian  refers  to  the  frequent  denial  by  philosophers  that  the  gods 
had  any  regard  for  human  affairs,  and  to  the  light  and  easy  way  in 
which  men  accordingly  held  themselves  at  liberty  to  take  any  oath, 
as  matters  of  fact  properly  used  by  advocates. — [Instit.  Orat.,  V. :  6. 

"Happy  the  man  who  is  able  to  understand  the  causes  of  things, 
and  so  has  trampled  under  foot  all  fear,  and  the  inexorable  fate,  and 
the  roar  of  greedy  Acheron." — [Virgil :  Greorg. :  II. :  490-49?. 

XXVIII.:  p.  43, — "A  discussion  has  arisen  [said  Cotta]  between 
Velleius  and  myself  concerning  a  great  matter ;  .  .  we  were  treating  of 
the  nature  of  the  Gods.  Since  this  has  seemed  to  me  an  extremely  ob- 
scure subject,  as  indeed  it  is  always  wont  to  seem,  I  was  interrogating 
Velleius  as  to  the  sentiments  of  Epicurus.  .  .  Therefore  I,  who  am 
myself  a  Pontif ex,  who  think  that  public  religious  rites  and  ceremonies 
ought  sacredly  to  be  preserved,  not  only  desire  to  be  myself  persuaded 
of  the  opinion  first  of  all  that  there  are  Gods,  but  I  wish  to  have  it 
plainly  proved.  .  .  Yet  I  do  not  think  that  the  reasons  which  are  pre- 
sented for  it  by  you  are  sufficiently  solid.  .  .  It  seems  wonderful  that 
one  interpreter  of  the  sacrifices  should  meet  another  without  laughing; 
it  is  yet  more  wonderful  that  you  can  refrain  from  laughing  among 
yourselves.  .  .  As  to  the  voice  of  the  Faun,  I  certainly  have  never 
heard  it;  I  shall  believe  you,  if  you  tell  me  that  you  have  heard  it; 
though  I  do  not  in  the  least  know  what  a  Faun  may  be." — [Cicero: 
Nat.  Deor. :  I. :  7,  22,  26;  III. :  6. 

Gibbon  does  not  exaggerate  when  he  says,  in  his  stately  antithesis, 
that  the  philosophers  of  antiquity,  when  they  "  condescended  to  act  a 
part  on  the  theatre  of  superstition,  concealed  the  sentiments  of  an  athe- 
ist under  the  sacerdotal  robes,  and  approached  with  the  same  inward 
contempt,  and  the  same  external  reverence,  the  altars  of  the  Libyan, 
the  Olympian,  or  the  Capitoline  Jupiter " ;  or  when  he  adds  that  "the 
freedom  of  the  city  was  bestowed  on  all  the  gods  of  mankind." — ["De- 
cline and  FaU":  Boston  ed.,  1854:  Vol.  1:  pp.  168,  170. 

XXIX. :  p.  43.-^"£Jecrops  and  Theseus,  who  were  regarded  as  hav- 
ing been  successive  founders  of  Athens,  had  temples  there.  Abdera 
offered  sacrifices  to  its  founder  Timesius,  Thera  to  Theras,  Tenedos  to 
Tenes,  Delos  to  Anius,  Cyrene  to  Battus,  Miletus  to  Naleus,  Amphi- 
polis  to  Hagnon.  In  the  time  of  Pisistratus,  one  Miltiades  went  to 
found  a  colony  in  the  Thracian  Chersonesus ;  this  colony  instituted  a 
worship  for  him  after  his  death,  '  according  to  the  ordinary  usage.'  .  , 
Every  man  who  had  rendered  a  great  service  to  the  city,  from  the  one 


394  APFENDIJC. 

who  had  founded  it  co  the  one  who  had  given  it  a  victory,  or  had  im- 
proved its  laws,  became  a  god  for  that  city.  .  .  The  inhabitants  oi 
Acanthus  worshipped  a  Persian  who  had  died  among  them  during  the 
expedition  of  Xerxes.  .  .  Crotona  worshipped  a  hero  for  the  sole 
reason  that  during  his  life  he  had  been  the  handsomest  man  in  the 
city."— [Coulanges:  "The  Ancient  City":  Boston ed.,  1874:  pp.  188-9, 
196. 

"Hence  [like  Eomulus  and  Hercules],  Liber  [Bacchus]  became  a 
God,  who  was  born  of  Semele ;  and  on  the  same  renown  of  fame  the 
brother-sons  of  Tyndareus  [Castor  and  Pollux],  who  are  declared  to 
have  been  not  only  helpers  of  the  Roman  people  to  victory  in  their 
battles,  but  also  messengers  announcing  their  success.  .  .  Why!  is 
not  almost  the  whole  of  heaven — I  will  not  dwell  further  on  particu- 
lar instances — ^filled  with  those  of  human-kind  ?  If  I  should  attempt 
to  search  into  antiquity,  and  thence  to  produce  the  things  which  Greek 
writers  have  asserted,  even  those  who  are  esteemed  the  gods  of  the 
principal  peoples  would  be  found  to  have  been  taken  up  from  among 
us  into  heaven." — [Cicero:  Tuscul.  Quaest. :  I.:  12,  13. 

XXX. :  p.  43. — "Indeed  at  the  games  which  his  heir,  Augustus,  firet 
set  forth  as  consecrated  to  him,  a  comet  [a  hairy  star]  blazed  forth  dur- 
ing seven  consecutive  days,  rising  at  about  the  eleventh  hour;  and  it 
was  believed  to  be  the  soul  of  Caesar,  now  received  into  heaven ;  and 
for  this  reason  a  star  is  placed  upon  his  head  in  his  statue." — [Suetonius: 
C.  J.  Caesar:  Lxxxviii. 

Concerning  Augustus,  Suetonius  reports,  in  like  manner,  that  an 
ancient  prediction  had  pointed  out  his  native  city,  Velletri,  as  the  birth- 
place of  a  Master  of  the  world ;  that  prodigies  and  strange  dreams  pre- 
ceded his  birth ;  that  when  his  father,  in  Thrace,  consulted  an  oracle 
about  his  son,  the  wine  on  the  altar  burst  into  a  flame  which  reached 
heaven  high ;  that  as  an  infant  he  was  taken  from  his  cradle  by  invis- 
ible hands,  carried  to  the  top  of  a  lofty  tower,  and  left  facing  the  rising 
sun ;  that  an  eagle  snatched  bread  from  his  hand  when  he  was  dining, 
bore  it  up  into  the  sky,  and  then  restored  it ;  that  as  he  was  entering 
Rome,  after  Caesar's  death,  suddenly,  in  a  clear  ^a^a  cu'cular  rainbow 
surrounded  the  sun;  etc.,  etc. — [Octav.  Augu^(HBkv.-xcvi. 


XXXI.:  p.  43. — "But  Rome  began  to  crave  a  more  concrete  God 
than  the  Capitolian  Jove,  and  found  a  living  and  most  terrible  deity  in 
the  person  of  her  Emperor.  Earth  could  offer  nothing  more  divin,  in 
the  sense  of  a  majesty  at  once  recognized  and  obeyed,  and  Paganism 
did  but  push  its  principles  to  their  consequence  in  deifying  the  Caesars ; 
but  reason  fell  to  the  lowest  depth  of  degradation,  and  the  Egyptians 
grovelling  before  the  beasts  of  the  Nile  outraged  hmnanity  less  than  the 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II,  395 

«ge  of  the  Antonines,  with  its  philosophers  and  jurisconsults  I'endeiiag 
divine  honors  to  the  Emperor  Commodus."— [Fred.  Ozanam:  "Civili- 
zation in  Fifth  Cent.":  London  ed.,  1867:  Vol.  1:  p.  80. 

"  From  the  time  of  Julius  and  Augustus  his  [the  Emperor's]  person 
had  been  hallowed  by  the  office  of  chief  pontiff  and  the  tribunician 
power ;  to  swear  by  his  head  was  considered  the  most  solemn  of  all 
oaths ;  his  effigy  was  sacred,  even  on  a  coin ;  to  him,  or  to  his  Genius, 
temples  were  erected  and  divine  honours  paid  while  he  lived ;  and  when, 
as  it  was  expressed,  he  ceased  to  be  among  men,  the  title  of  Divus  was 
accorded  to  him,  after  a  solemn  consecration.  In  the  confused  multi- 
plicity of  mythologies,  the  worship  of  the  Emperor  was  the  only  wor- 
ship common  to  the  whole  Roman  world,  and  was  therefore  that  usu- 
ally proposed  to  the  Christians  on  their  trial. " — [Bryce :  ' '  Holy  Roman 
Emi)ire";  London  ed.,  1876:  pp.  22-3. 

XXXIL  :  p.  43. — "There  is  no  more  curious  fragment  of  antiquity 
than  the  Vision  of  Judgment  which  Seneca  has  left  us  on  the  death 
and  deification  of  Claudius.  .  .  .  When  Claudius  expired  in  the 
month  of  October,  his  soul,  according  to  the  satirist,  long  lodged  in  the 
inflated  emptiness  of  his  own  swollen  carcass,  migrated  by  an  easy 
transition  into  a  kindred  pumpkin.  The  Senate  declared  that  he  had 
become  a  god ;  but  Seneca  knew  that  he  was  only  transformed  into  a 
gourd.  The  Senate  decreed  his  divinity;  Seneca  translated  it  into 
pumpkinity ;  and  proceeded  to  give  a  burlesque  account  of  what  had 
happened  in  heaven  on  the  appearance  of  the  new  aspirant  to  celestial 
honours." — [Merivale  :  "Hist,  of  the  Romans":  London  ed.,  3856: 
Vol.  5:  p.  601. 

Yet,  a  little  before,  the  same  philosopher  had  said,  of  the  same 
Claudius :  ' '  The  emperor  is  divine ;  the  divinity  is  with  and  around 
those  blessed  by  employment  in  his  service.  .  .  Distant  be  the  day, 
and  reserved  for  the  tears  of  our  grand-children,  when  his  divine  pro- 
genitors shall  demand  for  him  the  heavens  which  are  his  own  "  I — 
[Cousol.  ad  Polyb.,  31,  32. 


XXXIII. :  p.  ^1^" Already  the  Senate  had  commended  the  womb 
of  Poppaea  to  tlj^^Hp,  and  had  undertaken  vows  for  public  perfoim- 
ance.  These  thl^^pFere  multiplied  and  fulfilled  [after  the  birth],  and 
there  were  added  supplications  and  a  temple  to  Fecundity,  etc.  These 
things  were  temporary,  however,  the  infant  having  died  within  the 
fourth  month.  But  agaiu  arose  the  sei-vile  adulations  of  those  decree- 
ing homage  to  her  as  a  Goddess,  with  a  Divine  bed  of  state,  a  Temple, 
and  a  Priest."— [Tacitus  :  Annal. :  XV. :  23. 

XXXIV. :  p.  44.— "At  the  first  attack  of  sickness,  he  said:  'Alas!  I 


\ 


396  APPENDIX. 

suspect  I  am  becoming  a  God '  [Vae,  puto,  Deus  fio  !] " — [Suetoiuus  j 
*' Vespasian.":  xxm. 

XXXV.:  p.  44. — "The  sun  was  worshipped  at  Emesa,  under  the 
name  of  Elegabalus,  and  under  the  form  of  a  black  conical  stone, 
which,  as  it  was  universally  believed,  had  fallen  from  heaven  on  that 
sacred  place.  .  .  In  a  solemn  procession  through  the  streets  of  Rome, 
the  way  was  strewed  with  gold  dust ;  the  black  stone,  set  in  precious 
gems,  was  placed  on  a  chariot  drawn  by  six  milk-white  horses  richly 
caparisoned.  .  .  In  a  magnificent  temple  raised  on  the  Palatine 
mount,  the  sacrifices  of  the  god  Elegabalus  were  celebrated  with  every 
circumstance  of  cost  and  solemnity.  .  .  Around  the  altar  a  chorus  of 
Syrian  damsels  performed  their  lascivious  dances,  to  the  soimd  of  bar- 
barian music,  whilst  the  gravest  personages  of  the  state  and  army  offi- 
ciated in  the  meanest  functions,  with  affected  zeal  and  secret  indigna- 
tion."—[Gibbon  :  "Decline and  Fall,"  etc. ;  London  ed.,  1848  :  Vol.  1: 
pp.  188-9. 

XXXVI. :  p.  44. — "With  perfect  propriety  you  give  divine  honors 
to  your  departed  emperors,  as  you  worship  them  in  hf  e.  The  gods  will 
count  themselves  indebted  to  you :  nay,  it  will  be  matter  of  high  re- 
joicing among  them  that  their  masters  are  made  their  equals.  But 
when  you  adore  Larentina,  a  public  prostitute — I  could  have  wished 
that  it  might  at  least  have  been  Lais  or  Phryne — among  your  Junos, 
and  Cereses,  and  Dianas;  when  you  instal  in  your  pantheon  Simon 
Magus,  giving  him  a  statue  and  the  title  of  Holy  God ;  when  you  make 
an  infamous  court-page  a  god  of  the  sacred  synod, — although  yoiu*  an- 
cient deities  are  in  reality  no  better,  they  will  still  think  themselves 
affronted  by  you,  that  the  privilege  which  antiquity  conferred  on  them 
alone  has  been  allowed  to  others. " — [Tertullian :  Apolog. ,  13. 

XXX Vn. :  p.  44. — "If  a  man  should  be  able  to  assent  to  this  doc- 
trine, as  he  ought,  that  we  are  all  sprung  from  God  in  an  especial 
manner,  and  that  God  is  the  father  both  of  men  and  of  gods,  I  suppose 
that  he  would  never  have  any  ignoble  or  mean  thoughts  about  him- 
self. .  .  What  then  is  the  nature  of  God  ?  Flesh?  Certainly  not. 
An  estate  in  land?  By  no  means.  Fame?  Np^-  Is  it  intelligence, 
knowledge,  right  reason?  Yes.  Herein,  then,  seek  simply  the  nature 
of  the  Good."— [Epictetus:  I. :  3  :  H. :  8. 
Of  his  want  of  popular  success  in  his  teaching,  he  says  himself: — 
"Who  among  us,  for  the  sake  of  this  matter,  has  consulted  a  seer? 
Who  among  us,  as  to  his  actions,  has  not  slept  in  indifference?  Who? 
Give  [name]  to  me  one :  that  I  may  see  the  man  whom  I  have  been 
looking  for  long,  who  is  truly  noble  and  ingenuous,  whether  young  or 
old.    Name  him !  "—[II. :  16. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  397 

XXXVin. :  p.  45. — ''Atheism  is  but  false  reasoning",  single;  but  su- 
perstition is  a  disorder  of  the  mind,  produced  by  this  false  reasoning. 
.  .  Atheism  is  an  absolute  insensibility  to  God,  which  does  not 
recognize  goodness:  while  superstition  is  a  blind  heap  of  passions, 
which  imagine  the  good  to  be  evil." — [Plutarch  :  Of  Superstit.,  2;  6. 
"Morals":  Boston  ed.,  1874:  Vol.  1:  pp.  169,  174. 

XXXIX. :  p.  46. — Theodore  Parker  was  an  energetic  theist,  not  a 
pantheist:  yet  hardly  any  passage  in  his  writings  is  more  beautiful  in 
form  and  fancy  than  that  in  which  he  seeks  to  show  the  genesis  of 
poetic  and  philosophic  pantheism: — 

"The  All  of  things  appears  so  beautiful  to  the  comprehensive  eye, 
that  we  almost  think  it  is  its  own  Cause  and  Creator.  The  animals 
find  their  support  and  their  pleasure;  the  painted  leopard  and  the 
snowy  swan,  each  living  by  its  own  law;  the  bird  of  passage  that  pur- 
sues, from  zone  to  zone,  its  unmarked  path ;  the  summer  warbler  which 
sings  out  its  melodious  existence  in  the  woodbine;  the  flowers  that 
come  unasked,  charming  the  youthful  year;  the  golden  fruit  maturing 
in  its  wilderness  of  green;  the  dew  and  the  rainbow;  the  frost-flake 
and  the  mountain  snow;  the  glories  that  wait  upon  the  morning,  or 
sing  the  sun  to  his  ambrosial  rest ;  the  pomp  of  the  sun  at  noon,  amid 
the  clouds  of  a  June  day;  the  awful  pomp  of  night,  when  all  the  stars 
come  out,  and  tread  their  round,  and  seem  to  watch  in  blest  tranquill- 
ity about  the  slumbering  world ;  the  moon  waning  and  waxing,  walk- 
ing in  beauty  through  the  night:  daily  the  water  is  rough  with  the 
winds ;  they  come  or  abide  at  no  man's  bidding,  and  roll  the  yellow 
corn,  or  make  religious  music  at  night-fall  in  the  pines ; — ^these  things 
are  all  so  fair,  so  wondrous,  so  wrapt  in  mystery,  it  is  no  marvel  that 
men  say.  This  is  divine.  Yes,  the  All  is  God.  He  is  the  Hght  of  the 
morning,  the  beauty  of  the  noon,  and  the  strength  of  the  sun.  .  .  The 
soul  of  all;  more  moving  than  motion;  more  stable  than  rest;  fairer 
than  beauty,  and  stronger  than  strength.  The  power  of  nature  is  God." 
—["Discourse  of  Eehgion";  Boston  ed.,  1842  :  pp.  89-90. 

XL. :  p.  46.— "Know,  at  the  outset,  that  heaven  and  earth,  and  the 
watery  plains,  and  the  moon's  lucent  orb,  and  Titan's  shining  stars,  a 
spirit  within  keeps  alive :  a  mind  pervading  each  limb  stirs  the  whole 
mass,  and  mingles  with  the  mighty  body.  Hence  spring  the  races  of 
men  and  beasts,  and  living  things  with  wings,  and  the  strange  forms 
which  the  ocean  bears  beneath  his  marble  surface." — [Virgil:  ^neid: 
VI. :  724,  et  seq. 

"As  Plato's  real  opinion,  however,  we  can  only  maintain  this  much, 
that  the  [world]  soul — diffused  throughout  the  universe,  and  by  virtue 
of  its  nature  ceaselessly  self-moving,  according  to  fixed  laws — causea 


# 


39S  APPENDIX. 

the  division  as  well  as  the  motion  of  matter  in  the  heavenly  spheres : 
and  that  its  harmony  and  life  are  revealed  in  the  order  and  courses  of 
the  stars.  The  Timaeus  also  connects  the  intelligence  of  the  World- 
Soul  with  its  motion  and  harmonious  distribution," — [Zeller  :  "  Plato, 
and  the  Older  Academy";  London  ed.,  1876  :  p.  357. 

Perhaps  as  distinct  a  statement  as  any  of  the  pantheistic  scheme  of 
thought  is  the  following,  from  the  Upanishads : — 

"He  is  my  self  within  the  heart ;  smaller  than  a  corn  of  rice,  smaller 
than  a  barley-corn,  smaller  than  a  mustard-seed,  smaller  than  a  canary- 
seed, — yea,  than  the  kernel  of  a  canafy-seed !  He  also  is  my  self,  within 
the  heart ;  greater  than  the  earth,  greater  than  the  sky,  greater  than 
heaven,  greater  than  all  these  worlds.  He  from  whom  all  works, 
all  desires,  all  sweet  odours  and  tastes  proceed,  who  embraces  all  this, 
who  never  speaks  and  is  never  surprised.  He,  my  self  within  the 
heart,  is  that  Brahman." — [Quoted  in  Rhys  Davids'  Lects.  on  "In- 
dian Buddhism";  New  York  ed.,  1882  :  pp.  309-10. 

"The  personal  Brahman,  like  the  impersonal,  was  the  result  of 
theory  and  meditation ;  in  both.  Brahman  was  a  product  of  reflection, 
without  life  and  ethical  force,  without  participation  in  the  fortunes  of 
men  and  states,  without  love  and  anger,  without  sympathy  and  pity; 
a  colourless,  abstract,  super-personal,  and  therefore  impersonal  being, 
the  strictest  opposite  of  that  mighty  personality  into  which  the  Jehovah 
of  the  Hebrews  grew,  owing  to  the  historical,  practical,  and  ethical 
development  of  the  conception. " — [Duncker  :  ' '  History  of  Antiquity  " ; 
London  ed.,  1880  :  Vol.  4  :  p.  160. 

XLI. :  p.  47. — "Rightly  understood,  the  Persian  doctrine  knows  but 
of  one  true  perfect  God,  under  a  personal  conception ;  and  he  only  ap- 
pears in  the  Zend  writings  with  all  the  properties  and  prerogatives  of 
deity.  His  name  Ormuzd  [Ahura  -  Mazda]  signifies  '  the  eternally 
wise ' ;  he  is  the  all-wise  and  all-powerful  creator  and  sovereign  of  the 
world.  .  .  Over  against  the  author  of  all  that  is  good  and  pure,  there 
stands  a  hostile  being,  an  evil  spirit  called  Druckhs  (Lie).  .  .  But  is 
he  from  Eternity?  TKIp  Parsi  doctrine  Joiows  of  no  abstract  and  abso- 
lute dualism ;  nay,  according  to  one  passage,  '  the  good  as  well  as  the 
evil  spirit  was  created  by  Ormuzd ' ;  and  Ahriman  is  always  placed  far 
below  Ormuzd." — [DQllinger  :  "The  Gentile  and  the  Jew";  London 
cd.,  1862  :  Vol.  1  :  pp.  385-7. 

"  This  merely  philosophical  doctrine  is  not  to  be  confounded  with  his 
theology,  according  to  which  he  [Zarathushtra]  acknowledged  only 
one  God,  as  will  be  clearly  seen  from  the  second  G^tha." — [Haug  : 
"Religion  of  the  Parsis";  London  ed.,  1878  :  p.  149. 

As  striking  an  instance  as  will  probably  ever  be  given,  in  a  highly 
developed  civilization,  of  the  way  in  which  men  limit  God's  power  oi 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  399 

reject  His  unity,  when  reasoning  from  the  sadder  phenomena  of  the 
wor'  d,  and  discarding  the  Christian  Revelation,  is  presented  by  Stuari 
Mill  in  his  "Essays  on  Religion."  The  resolute  and  serious  English- 
man simply  goes  back  to  the  thought  of  one  section  of  his  Aryan 
ancestors,  thousands  of  years  before: — 

"Nearly  all  the  things  which  men  are  hanged  or  imprisoned  for  do 
ing  to  one  another,  are  Nature's  every-day  performances.  Killing,  the 
most  criminal  act  recognized  by  human  laws,  Nature  does  once  to  every 
being  that  lives;  and  in  a  large  proportion  of  cases,  after  protracted 
tortures,  such  as  only  the  greatest  monsters  whom  we  read  of  ever  pur- 
posely inflicted  on  their  living  fellow-creatures.  .  .  Nature  impales 
men,  breaks  them  as  if  on  the  wheel,  casts  them  to  be  devoured  by  wild 
beasts,  burns  them  to  death,  crushes  them  with  stones  like  the  first 
Christian  martyr,  starves  them  with  hunger,  freezes  them  with  cold, 
poisons  them  by  the  quick  or  slow  venom  of  her  exhalations,  and  has 
hundreds  of  other  hideous  deaths  in  reserve,  such  as  the  ingenious 
cruelty  of  a  Nabis  or  a  Domitian  never  surpassed.  .  .  Nature  has 
Noyades  more  fatal  than  those  of  Carrier ;  her  explosions  of  fire-damp 
are  as  destructive  as  human  artillery ;  her  plague  and  cholera  far  sur- 
pass the  poison-cups  of  the  Borgias.  .  .  Anarchy,  and  the  Reign  of 
Terror,  are  overmatched  in  injustice,  ruin,  and  death,  by  a  hurricane 

and  a  pestilence One  only  form  of  belief  in  the  supernatural — 

one  only  theory  respecting  the  origin  and  government  of  the  universe — 
stands  wholly  clear  both  of  intellectual  contradiction  and  of  moral  obliq- 
uity. It  is  that  which,  resigning  irrevocably  the  idea  of  an  omnipotent 
creator,  regards  Nature  and  Life,  not  as  the  expression  throughout  of 
the  moral  character  and  purpose  of  the  Deity,  but  as  the  product  of  a 
struggle  between  contriving  goodness  and  an  intractable  material,  as  was 
believed  by  Plato,  or  a  Principle  of  Evil,  as  was  the  doctrme  of  the 
Manicheans." — [Mill :  "Essays  on  Religion";  New  York  ed.,  1874- 
pp.  28-31,  116. 

XLII. :  p.  47. — "Who  knows  not,  O  Bithynian  Volusius,  what 
monsters  crazy  Egypt  worships  1  One  part  of  the  people  adores  the 
crocodile ;  another  trembles  before  an  ibis  glutted  with  serpents.  The 
golden  image  of  the  sacred  tailed-monkey  shines  among  the  effigies  of 
the  gods,  where  the  magic  chords  resound  from  Mem  n  on  broken  in 
twain,  and  ancient  Thebes  with  her  hundred  gates  lies  overwhelmed  in 
ruin.  At  one  point  they  venerate  fish  from  the  sea,  at  another  fish  of 
the  river,  at  yet  another  whole  cities  worship  a  dog;  no  one  Diana.  A 
leek  and  an  onion  it  is  impious  to  dishonor  and  break  with  the  teeth. 
O  holy  nations,  for  whom  such  Deities  grow  in  their  gardens" ! — [Ju 
venal :  Sat.  XV. :  1-11. 

XLIII. :  p.  48. — "He  [Heraclitus]  personifies  this  divine  element 


400  APPENDIX. 

[Fire],  and  says  that  men  are  mortal  gods,  and  gods  immortal  men, 
our  life  is  the  death  of  the  gods,  and  our  death  their  life." — [Zeller  i 
"Hist,  of  Greek  Philosophy":  [Pre-Socratic] ;  London  ed.,  1881 :  Vol. 
2:  p.  84. 

XLIV. :  p.  48. — "The  fact  is.  Theism  is  also  a  tradition,  and  not,  aa 
is  claimed,  a  universal  intuition  of  the  soul.  It  is  no  more  a  univer- 
sal intuition  than  the  Holy  Ghost  is  a  universal  intuition,  than  mirac- 
ulous mediation  is  a  universal  intuition.  It  is  the  intuition  of  such 
souls  only  as  happen  to  come  within  the  range  of  that  particular  pencil 
of  light  with  which  Hebrew  tradition  has  streaked  the  world's  history. 
The  larger  portion  of  the  human  family  have  always  been,  and  are 
still,  without  that  illumination,  and  without  that  idea :  and  he  who 
fancies  that  outside  of  this  historic  beam  he  would  have  had  the  idea 
of  God  which  he  now  has,  confounds  traditional  experience  with  orig- 
inal intuition.  .  .  The  idea  of  one  only  God,  self-existent,  almighty, 
wise  and  good.  Creator  and  Father  of  all,  is  a  Hebrew  tradition.  The 
conceptions  which  simulate  this  idea  in  other  faiths  will  be  found,  on 
closer  inspection,  to  have  but  little  aflSnity  with  it." — [Frederick  H. 
Hedge,  D.D.,  Christian  Examiner,  September,  1864:  pp.  150-151. 

"And  if  we  are  asked  how  this  one  Abraham  possessed  not  only  the 
primitive  intuition  of  God  as  He  had  revealed  Himself  to  all  mankind, 
but  passed  through  the  denial  of  all  other  gods  to  the  knowledge  of 
the  One  God,  we  are  content  to  answer  that  it  was  by  a  special  Divine 
Revelation.  "We  do  not  indulge  in  theological  phraseology,  but  we 
mean  every  word  to  its  fullest  extent.  The  Father  of  Truth  chooses 
His  own  prophets,  and  He  speaks  to  them  in  a  voice  stronger  than  the 
voice  of  thunder.  It  is  the  same  inner  voice  through  which  God 
speaks  to  all  of  us.  That  voice  may  dwindle  away,  and  become  hardly 
audible  :  it  may  lose  its  Divine  accent,  and  sink  into  the  language  of 
worldly  prudence  :  but  it  may  also,  from  time  to  time,  assume  its  real 
nature  with  the  chosen  of  God,  and  sound  into  their  ears  as  a  voice 
from  Heaven." — [Max  Muller  :  "Chips  from  a  German  Workshop"; 
New  York  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  1:  pp.  367-8. 

"  However,  this  must  be  confessed,  that  under  the  guidance  of  Di- 
vine Providence,  the  great  and  beautiful  doctrine  of  one  God  seem? 
most  early  embraced  by  the  great  Jewish  Lawgiver  :  incorporated  in 
his  national  legislation  :  defended  with  rigorous  enactments,  and 
slowly  communicated  to  the  world.  At  our  day  it  is  difficult  to  un- 
derstand the  service  rendered  to  the  human  race  by  the  mighty  soul  of 
Moses,  and  that  a  thousand  years  before  Anaxagoras  was  bom.  Hia 
name  is  ploughed  into  the  history  of  the  world.  His  influence  can 
never  die." — [Theodore  Parker  :  "  Discourse  of  Religion  " ;  Boston  ed. 
1842:  p.  101. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  401 

XL  v.:  p.  49. — "Clearchus,  who  was  the  scholar  of  Aristotle,  and 
inferior  to  no  one  of  the  Peripatetics,  says  that  Aiistotle  his  master  re- 
lated what  follows  of  a  Jew  :  .  .  '  The  man  was  by  birth  a  Jew,  and 
came  from  Coelo-Syria.  .  .  Now  this  man,  when  he  was  hospitably 
treated  by  a  great  many,  came  down  from  the  upper  country  to  the 
places  near  the  sea,  and  became  a  Grecian,  not  only  in  his  language, 
but  in  his  soul  also :  insomuch  that  when  we  ourselves  happened  to  be 
m  Asia,  about  the  same  places  whither  he  came,  he  conversed  with  us, 
and  with  other  philosophical  persons,  and  made  a  trial  of  our  skill  in 
philosophy :  and,  as  he  had  lived  with  many  learned  men,  he  commu- 
nicated to  us  more  information  than  he  received  from  us.'  This  is 
Aristotle's  account  of  the  matter,  as  given  us  by  Clearchus." — [Jose- 
phus:  adv.  Apion:  1:  23. 

"This  philosopher  [Aristotle],  seeing  that  a  court  was  about  to  be 
summoned  to  try  him,  on  the  ground  of  his  being  guilty  of  impiety, 
on  account  of  certain  of  his  philosophical  tenets  which  the  Athenians 
regarded  as  impious,  withdrew  from  Athens,  and  fixed  his  school  in 
Chalcis,  defending  his  course  by  saying :  '  Let  us  depart  from  Athens, 
that  we  may  not  give  the  Athenians  a  handle  for  incurring  guilt  a 
second  time,  as  formerly  in  the  case  of  Socrates.'" — [Origen :  adv. 
Celsus:  1:  65. 

XL VI. :  p.  50. — "  The  rays  of  light  which  bear  witness  to  the  exist- 
ence of  these  worlds  cuxjling  in  their  unfathomable  depths,  have  many 
of  them  required  millions  of  years  to  reach  our  planet.  Many  of  those 
brilliant  orbs  might  have  become  extinct  ages  ago,  and  yet  their  rays, 
sent  forth  up  to  the  moment  of  their  destruction,  would  still  announce 
their  past  glory  to  countless  worlds.  Thus  with  every  improvement 
of  the  telescope  not  only  the  magnitude,  but  also  the  age,  of  the  visible 
universe  increases  ;  and  as  we  dive  deeper  and  deeper  into  the  abysses 
of  celestial  space,  we  also  plunge  deeper  and  deeper  into  the  ocean  of 
the  past ;  and  if  we  could  fly  to  those  islands  of  light,  which  even  our 
giant  telescopes  are  scarce  able  to  reveal,  we  still  should  be  only  on 
the  threshold  of  new  worlds,  and  how  far  should  we  have  to  fly  before 
we  reached  the  regions  of  formless  void,  if  such  there  be  " ! — [Hartwlg: 
"  Harmonies  of  Nature  " ;  New  York  ed.,  1866:  pp.  9-10. 

XL VII. :  p.  52. — "  But,  in  the  market-place  of  the  Athenians,  there 
are  other  works  which  are  not  obvious  to  every  one,  and  among  the 
rest  an  altar  of  Pity:  which  divinity,  as  she  is  above  all  others  benefl- 
cial  to  human  life,  amid  the  mutability  of  human  affairs,  is  alono- 
among  all  the  Greeks  reverenced  by  the  Athenians." — [Pausanias: 
'Descript.  of  Greece":  L:  17. 
26 


402  APPENDIX. 

XLVIII. :  p.  54. — *'  Caesar,  the  Dictator,  they  say,  having  on  one  oo 
casion  accidentally  had  a  fall  in  his  chariot,  was  always  in  the  habit, 
immediately  on  taking  his  seat,  of  repeating  three  times  a  certain  for- 
mula, with  the  view  of  ensuring  safety  upon  the  journey;  a  thing  that 
to  my  own  knowledge  is  done  by  many  persons  at  the  present  day." — 
[Pliny:  Hist.  Nat.:  XX vm.:  4. 

XLIX. :  p.  55. — "It  is  becoming  to  a  man  to  speak  what  is  good 
concerning  the  Deities,  for  so  is  blame  the  less.  .  .  To  me  it  is  im- 
possible to  call  either  of  the  Blessed  Ones  a  glutton ;  I  stand  aloof 
from  such  a  thought." — [Pindar:  Olymp.  Ode:  I. 

"It  is  said  of  Piudar,  that  when  he  was  a  young  man,  as  he  was 
going  to  Thespia,  being  wearied  -svith  the  heat,  as  it  was  noon,  and  in 
the  height  of  summer,  he  fell  asleep,  at  a  small  distance  from  the  public 
road ;  and  that  bees,  as  he  was  asleep,  flew  to  him,  and  wrought  their 
honey  on  his  hps.  This  circumstance  first  iaduced  Piudar  to  compose 
verses.  But  when  his  reputation  spread  through  all  Greece,  the 
Pythian  deity  raised  his  glory  to  a  still  greater  height,  by  ordering  the 
Delphi  to  assign  to  Pindar  an  equal  part  of  those  first-fruits  which 
were  offered  to  Apollo." — [Pausanias:  "Descript.  of  Greece":  IX. :  2^. 

L. :  p.  55. — "They  [the  tales  preserved  at  Athens]  speak  of  the  gods 
in  prose  as  well  as  verse,  .  .  and  as  they  proceed  not  far  from  the 
beginning  they  narrate  the  birth  of  the  gods,  and  how  after  they  were 
born  they  behaved  to  one  another.  Whether  these  stories  have  a  good 
or  a  bad  influence  I  should  not  like  to  be  severe  on  them,  because  they 
are  ancient ;  but  I  must  say  that,  looking  at  them  with  reference  to  the 
duties  of  children  to  their  parents,  I  cannot  praise  them,  or  think  that 
they  are  useful,  or  at  all  true.  .  .  He  who  would  be  dear  to  God  must, 
as  far  as  is  possible,  be  like  him,  and  such  as  he  is.  .  .  And  this  is  the 
conclusion,  which  is  also  the  noblest  and  truest  of  all  sayiags ;  That 
for  the  good  man  to  offer  sacrifice  to  the  gods,  and  hold  converse  with 
them  by  means  of  prayers  and  offerings,  and  every  kind  of  service,  is 
the  noblest  and  best  of  all  things,  and  also  the  most  conducive  to  a 
^^PPy  life»  and  very  fit  and  meet.  But  with  the  bad  man,  the  opposite 
of  this  holds ;  .  .  and  from  one  who  is  polluted,  neither  a  good  man  nor 
God  is  right  in  receiving  gifts. "—[Plato:  "Laws":  X.:  886;  IV.:  716. 

LI.:  p.  55. — "To  the  Gods  he  [Socrates]  simply  prayed  that  they 
would  give  him  good  things ;  as  beheviag  that  the  Gods  knew  best 
what  things  are  good.  .  .  He  said  that  it  would  not  become  the  Gods 
to  dehght  in  large  rather  than  iu  small  sacrifices ;  since,  if  such  were 
the  case,  the  offerings  of  the  bad  would  often  be  more  acceptable  to 
them  than  those  of  the  good;  .   .   but  he  thought  that  the  Gods  had 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  11.  403 

the  most  pleasure  in  the  offerings  of  the  most  pious." — [Xenophon: 
Memor.,  I.:  3;  2,  3. 

UI.:  p.  55.— 

"  But  pride  begets  the  mood 
Of  wanton,  tyrant  power  ; 

Pride,  filled  with  many  thoughts,  yet  filled  in  vain, 
Untimely,  ill-advised, 
Scaling  the  topmost  height, 
Falls  to  the  abyss  of  woe. 
Where  ?tep  that  proflteth 
It  seeks  in  vain  to  take." 

[Sophocles:  CEdipus,  the  King:  (Plumptre's 
Trans.);  874-878. 
The  injuries  whioh  the  G-ods  send  are  often,  however,  irrespective  ol 
character  in  those  who  suffer  them : — 

"  Such  ihs,  at  any  rate,  were  those  I  fell  on. 
The  Gods  still  leading  me  ;  nor  can  I  think 
My  father's  soul,  if  it  returned  to  life, 
"Would  plead  against  me  here." 

["CEdipus,  atColonos":  995-999. 

*'  Let  no  man,  in  his  scorn  of  present  fortune. 
And  thirst  for  other,  mar  his  good  estate ; 
Zeus  is  the  avenger  of  o'er-lofty  thoughts, 
A  terrible  controller.    Therefore  now, 
Since  voice  of  God  bids  him  be  wise  of  heart, 
Admonish  him  with  counsel  true  and  good 
To  cease  his  daring  sacrilegious  pride." 

[^schylus :  ' '  The  Persians  " :  (Plumptre's  Trans.) ; 

821-827. 
Yet  the  same  poet  says  also,  by  the  chorus: 

"  Who,  Zeus  excepted,  doth  not  pity  thee 
In  these  thine  ills  ?    But  He, 
Ruthless,  with  soul  unbent. 
Subdues  the  heavenly  host,  nor  will  he  cease 
Until  his  heart  be  satiate  with  power. 
Or  some  one  seize  with  subtle  stratagem 
The  sovereign  might  that  so  resistless  seemed." 

[''Prometheus  Bound":  167-174. 

LUI. :  p.  55. — "The  God  of  Christians  is  a  God  who  makes  the  soul 
feel  that  He  is  its  only  good;  that  all  its  repose  is  in  Him,  and  that  it 
will  have  no  joy  but  in  loving  Him ;  who  makes  it  at  the  same  time 
abhor  the  obstacles  which  restrain  it,  and  hinder  it  from  loving  Him 
with  all  its  strength.  The  self-love  and  concupiscence  which  arrest  it  t^jtoj 
become  insupportable  to  it.     This  God  makes  the  soul  feel  that  it  has  this     "'^■' 


404  APPENDIX. 

«eK-love  deeply  grounded  in  it,  and  that  He  alone  can  cure  it." — [Pas- 
cal :  "Pensees":  Sec.  Par.,  Art.  XV.:  2. 

LIV. :  p.  56. — "One  of  their  most  striking  features  [of  the  Foramini- 
fera]  is  their  marvellous  minuteness.  James  Plancus,  who  first  discov- 
ered them  in  the  strand  of  Eimini,  in  the  year  1731,  counted  about 
6,000  of  their  shells  in  a  single  ounce  of  drift-sand;  and  Professor 
Schultze,  of  Bonn,  found  no  less  than  a  million  and  a  half  in  the  same 
quantity  of  pulverized  quartz,  from  the  shore  of  Mola  di  Gaeta,  .  . 
On  examining  a  plate  of  mosaic  through  a  microscope  of  very  moderate 
strength,  it  looks  no  better  than  the  roughest  patchwork  of  a  savage, ' 
while  the  unparalleled  perfection  of  the  butterfly's  wing  first  comes  to 
light  under  a  strong  magnifying  power.  .  .  Each  scale  is  itself  a  mas- 
terpiece of  art ;  and  many  thousands  of  these  minute  gems  are  required 
to  deck  the  wings  of  a  single  butterfly.  No  monarch  is  more  richly 
robed  than  this  mean  little  insect,  which  each  summer  brings  forth  in 
millions." — [Hartwig  :  ** Harmonies  of  Nature";  New  York  ed.,  1866: 
pp.  103,  204-5. 

LV. :  p.  57. — "Do  you  not  then  believe  that  the  gods  take  thought  for 
men?  .  .  Nor  did  it  satisfy  the  gods  to  take  care  of  the  body  only,  but, 
what  is  most  important  of  all,  they  implanted  in  him  the  soul,  his  most 
excellent  part.  For  what  other  animal  has  a  soul  to  understand,  first 
of  all,  that  the  gods,  who  have  arranged  such  a  vast  and  noble  order  of 
liiings,  exist  ?  What  other  species  of  animals,  besides  man,  offers 
worship  to  the  gods  ?  .  .  What,  then,  must  they  do,  before  you  will 
think  that  they  take  thought  for  you?"— [Xenophon:  Memor. :  I.:  4: 
11,  13,  14. 

LVI. :  p.  57. — "  Is  it  not  something  worth  knowing,  worth  knowing 
even  to  us  after  the  lapse  of  four  or  five  thousand  yeai'S,  that  before  the 
separation  of  the  Aryan  race,  before  the  existence  of  Sanskrit,  Greek, 
or  Latin,  before  the  gods  of  the  Veda  had  been  worshipped,  and  before 
there  was  a  sanctuary  of  Zeus  among  the  sacred  oaks  of  Dodona,  one 
supreme  deity  had  been  found,  had  been  named,  had  been  invoked  by 
the  ancestors  of  our  race,  and  had  been  invoked  by  a  name  which  has 
never  been  excelled  by  any  other  name?" — [Max  Mtlller  :  "  Science  of 
Religion  " ;  New  York  ed.,  1872  :  p.  27.     See  also  pp.  71-72. 

"If  I  thoroughly  appreciated  these  first  words  of  the  Lord's  Prayer, 
*  Our  Father,  which  art  in  Heaven,'  and  really  believed  that  God,  who 
made  heaven  and  earth,  and  all  creatures,  and  has  all  things  in  Hia 
hand,  was  my  Father,  then  should  I  certainly  conclude  with  myself 
that  I  also  am  a  lord  of  heaven  and  earth ;  that  Christ  is  my  brother, 
Gabriel  my  servant,  Raphael  my  coachman,  and  all  the  angels  my  at 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  4:05 

sendants  at  need,  given  unto  me  by  my  neavenly  Father,  to  keep  ma 
n  the  path,  that  unawares  I  knock  not  my  foot  against  a  stone." — 
[Luther  :  Table  Talk:  XI. 

"When  the  ancients,  invoking  Jupiter,  called  him  Pater  hominum 
deorumque,  they  did  not  intend  to  say  that  Jupiter  was  the  fathej 
of  gods  and  men,  for  they  never  considered  him  as  such;  they  be- 
lieved, on  the  contrary,  that  the  human  race  existed  before  him.  The 
same  title  of  Pater  was  given  to  Neptune,  to  Apollo,  to  Bacchus,  to 
Vulcan,  and  to  Pluto.  These,  assuredly,  men  never  considered  as 
their  fathers.  So,  too,  the  title  of  Mater  was  applied  to  Minerva,  Di- 
fina,  and  Vesta,  who  were  reputed  virgin  goddesses.  .  .  The  idea  of 
paternity,  therefore,  was  not  attached  to  this  word.  The  old  language 
had  another  word  which  properly  designated  the  father,  and  which,  as 
ancient  as  Pater,  is  likewise  found  in  the  language  of  the  Greeks,  of 
the  Romans,  and  of  the  Hindus — gdnitar^  yevvrjTm,  genitor.  The  word 
pater  had  another  sense.  In  religious  language  they  applied  it  to  the 
gods ;  in  legal  language  to  every  man  who  had  a  worship  and  a  domain. 
The  poets  show  us  that  they  applied  it  to  every  one  whom  they  wished 
to  honor.  .  .  It  contained  in  itself  not  the  idea  of  paternity,  but  that 
of  power,  authority,  majestic  dignity." — [Coulanges  :  "The  Ancient 
City";  New  York  ed.,  1874  :  pp.  116-117. 

' '  The  Hindu  supreme  God  is  as  remote  as  possible  from  being  a  re- 
alization of  the  idea  *my  Father';  he  is  set  far  beyond  .Olympus,  on 
the  highest  and  most  inaccessible  Alpine  summits  of  a  chilling  and 
cheerless  solitude,  separated  by  a  whole  series  of  demim*ges  from  all 
care  of  the  universe,  or  participation  in  the  concerns  of  his  creatures."— 
[Prof.  W.  D.  Whitney  :  "Oriental  and  Linguistic  Studies":  First  Se- 
ries; New  York  ed.,  1872  :  p.  94. 

"  The  word  Father  was,  in  its  original  sense  [among  the  Aryans],  a 
title  of  dignity.  It  denotes  not  a  physical  relation,  but  an  office.  So 
clearly  was  this  conception  marked,  even  in  the  full  development  of 
Roman  Law,  that,  as  Ulpian  tells  us,  a  childless  man,  or  even  a  ward, 
might  be  a  Pater-familias." — [W.  E.  Hearn  :  "Aryan  Household"; 
London  ed.,  1879  :     p.  85. 

LVII. :  p.  58. — "  You  have  often  heard  me  speak  of  an  oracle  or  sign 
which  comes  to  me,  and  is  the  divinity  which  Meletus  ridicules  in  the 
Indictment.  This  sign  I  have  had  ever  since  I  was  a  child.  The  sign 
is  a  voice  which  comes  to  me,  and  always  forbids  me  to  do  something 
which  I  am  going  to  do,  but  never  conunands  me  to  do  anything ;  and 
this  is  what  stands  in  the  way  of  my  being  a  politician.  .  .  Hitherto 
the  familiar  oracle  within  me  has  constantly  been  in  the  habit  of  op- 
posing me,  even  about  trifles,  if  I  was  going  to  make  a  slip  or  error 
about  anything.    .   .   But  the  oracle  made  no  sign  of  opposition,  eithei 


406  APPENDIJ^. 

as  I  was  leaving  my  house  and  going  out  in  the  morning,  or  when  1 
was  going  up  into  this  court,  or,  while  I  was  speaking,  at  anything 
which  I  was  going  to  say  " :  et  seq. — [Plato :  "  Apology  " :  31,  40. 

*'  The  whole  personnel  of  the  man  had  something  out  of  the  conuuon 
and  remarkable  in  it.  There  was  no  one  to  compare  him  with,  was  the 
thought  that  struck  his  contemporaries ;  and  people  felt  the  effects  of 
his  society  as  that  of  an  irresistible  enchanter.  The  turn  he  had  for 
imparting  himself  to  every  one,  on  every  opportunity,  his  ready  will^ 
nay  eagerness,  to  engage  in  single  combat  with  the  first  and  best  dis- 
putants, joined  with  the  rare  gifts  of  making  himself  understood  by  all, 
great  and  simple,  in  their  ordinary  forms  of  speech,  of  developing  the 
germs  of  investigation  and  proof  in  them,  while  entangling  them  by 
concessions  the  consequences  of  which  they  never  dreamed  of ;  the  ar- 
tistic power  of  well-weighed  dialectic,  mth  which  he  destroyed  unreal 
knowledge ;  an  ironical  instinct,  drawing  everything  into  the  grasp  of 
his  own  dissecting  processes  of  thought,  while  simultaneously  unde- 
ceiving himself  and  others ; — all  this  contributed  to  make  him  a  vision 
of  wonder,  past  imitation,  and  a  deep  and  listing  mover  of  souls.  .  . 
From  the  time  the  oracle  at  Delphi  answered  his  disciple,  Chaerephon, 
that  no  one  on  earth  was  wiser  than  Socrates,  he  considered  himself  as 
a  missionary,  consecrated  to  the  service  of  the  deity,  and  his  exertions 
in  teaching  as  obedience  to  that  divine  voice." — [Dollinger:  "The 
Oentile  and  the  Jew":  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  1:  pp.  273-4. 

LVIII. :  p.  60. — Sokr.  "It  is  necessary  therefore  to  wait  until  one 
shall  learn  what  ought  to  be  his  attitude  towards  gods  and  towards 
men." 

Allr,  "When  then,  Sokrates,  will  this  time  come,  and  who  will  in- 
stanct  us  ?  For  I  think  nothing  would  give  me  more  pleasure  than  to 
see  that  man." 

Sokr.  "He  that  watches  over  you.  But  I  think  that,  just  as  Homer 
says  that  Athene  took  away  the  cloud  from  the  eyes  of  Diomedes,  '  that 
he  might  recognize  gods  and  men,'  so  you  ought  first  to  take  away 
from  your  soul  the  cloud  that  now  rests  upon  it,  and  then  use  the 
means  which  will  enable  you  to  discriminate  good  from  evil." — [Alki- 
biades  H. :  150  D. 

Athenseus  says  that  by  some  in  antiquity  this  Dialogue  was  attributed 
to  Xenophon  [Deipnos.  XI. :  114].  Modem  critics  generally  regard  it 
as  non-Platonic ;  though  Mr.  Grote  affirms  without  hesitation  its  Pla- 
tonic authorship,  supposing  it  to  have  been  written,  perhaps,  in  the 
philosopher's  early  life.— ["Plato":  London  ed.,  ia67:  Vol.  1:  pp. 
•348-361. 

LIX. :  p.  61.— "An  expansion,  a  corresponding  transformation,  of 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  107 

the  seuti  aent  concerning  outward  nature,  could  only  proceed  from  an 
essential  change  in  the  attitude  of  man  toward  the  physical  world. 
This  change  was  of  two  kinds.  On  the  one  hand,  modern  contempla- 
tion feels  intimations  in  nature  of  the  existence  of  a  universal  Spirit, 
of  which  the  human  spirit  is  reallj''  a  part,  or  with  which  at  least  it  has 
profound  affinities ;  then  also  it  perceives,  in  the  infinite  variety  of  the 
phenomena  which  strike  the  senses,  as  it  were  so  many  mirrors  to  re- 
flect the  vicissitudes  of  its  own  special  state ;  it  flatters  itself  that  it  can 
overhear  and  understand  the  language  of  nature,  in  that  majestic 
silence,  that  unchangeable  purity,  that  immutable  grandeur,  in  which 
it  seeks  and  always  finds  an  asylum  for  escape  from  the  assaults  of 
trouble,  and  from  the  foulness  and  the  pettiness  of  the  human  condi- 
tion."— [Friedlaender:  "Moeurs  Romaines":  Paris  ed.,  1867:  Tom.  11. : 
pp.  491-2. 

LX. :  p.  62. — The  vehemence  with  which  Francis  Newman  rejects 
Christianity,  as  a  religion  supematurally  inspired,  only  adds  emphasis 
to  words  like  the  following : — 

"The  great  doctrine  on  which  all  practical  religion  depends, — ^the 
-doctrine  which  nursed  the  infancy  and  youth  of  human  nature, — is, 
*  the  sympathy  of  God  with  the  perfection  of  individual  man.'  Among 
Pagans  this  was  so  marred  by  the  imperfect  character  ascribed  to  the 
Gods,  and  the  dishonourable  fables  told  concerning  them,  that  the  phi- 
losophers who  undertook  to  prune  religion  too  generally  cut  away  the 
root,  by  alleging  that  God  was  mere  Intellect,  and  wholly  destitute  of 
Affection.*  But,  happily,  among  the  Hebrews  the  purity  of  God's 
character  was  vindicated ;  and  with  the  growth  of  conscience  in  the 
highest  minds  of  the  nation  the  ideal  image  of  God  shone  brighter  and 
brighter.  The  doctrine  of  his  Sympathy  was  never  lost,  and  from  the 
Jews  it  passed  into  the  Christian  church.  This  doctrine,  applied  to 
that  part  of  man  which  is  divine,  is  the  well-spring  of  Repentance  and 
Humility,  of  Thankfulness,  Love,  and  Joy.  It  reproves,  and  it  com- 
forts ;  it  stimulates  and  animates.  This  it  is  which  led  the  Psalmist  to 
cry,  '  Whom  have  I  in  heaven  but  Thee  ?  there  is  none  upon  earth  that 
I  desire  beside  Thee.'  This  has  satisfied  prophets,  apostles,  and  martyrs, 
with  God  as  their  Portion.  This  has  been  passed  from  heart  to  heart 
for  full  three  thousand  years,  and  has  produced  bands  of  countless 
samts."— ["Phases  of  Faith":  London  ed.,  1881:  pp.  173-4. 

LXI. :  p.  63. — The  contrast  between  the  hard  atheism  and  the  rever- 


*  Prof.  Newman  adds  this  note :  "  Horace  and  Cicero  speak  tbe  mind  of  their 
educated  contemporaries,  in  saying  that '  We  ought  to  pray  to  God  only  for  external 
blessings,  but  trust  to  our  own  efforts  for  a  pure  and  tranquil  soul,*— a  singular  re« 
versing  of  spiriiual  religion  "  ! 


408  APPENDIJ^. 

ent  theism  Tvnich  still  face  each  other  in  cultivated  modem  societ;;^ 
could  hardly  be  more  sharply  presented  than  in  the  two  extracts  which 
follow.  Prof.  Clifford,  in  language  as  startling  as  any  in  literature, 
expels  the  Creator  from  the  universe,  to  fill  the  vacant  throne  with  the 
creature,  of  whose  imagination  he  conceives  the  Divine  to  have  been 
the  product : — 

"  For,  after  all,  such  a  helper  of  men,  outside  of  humanity,  the  truth 
will  not  allow  us  to  see.  The  dim  and  shadovry  outlines  of  the  super- 
human deity  fade  slowly  away  from  before  us ;  and  as  the  mist  of  his 
presence  floats  aside,  we  perceive  with  greater  and  greater  clearness  the 
shape  of  a  yet  grander  and  nobler  figure — of  Him  who  made  all  Gods, 
and  shall  unmake  them.  From  the  dim  dawn  of  history,  and  from 
the  inmost  depth  of  every  soul,  the  face  of  our  father  Man  looks  out 
upon  us,  with  the  fire  of  eternal  youth  in  his  eyes,  and  says :  '  Before 
Jehovah  was,  I  am.'" — ["Lectures  and  Essays":  London  ed.,  1879: 
Vol.  2:  p.  248. 

On  the  other  hand,  are  the  noble  words  of  James  Martineau: — "The 
universe  gives  us  the  scale  of  God,  and  Christ  his  spirit.  We  chmb  to 
the  infinitude  of  his  nature  by  the  awful  pathway  of  the  stars,  where 
whole  forests  of  worlds  silently  quiver  here  and  there,  like  a  small  leaf 
of  light.  We  dive  into  his  eternity,  through  the  ocean  waves  of  time, 
that  roll  and  solemnly  break  on  the  imagination,  as  we  trace  the  wrecks 
of  departed  things  upon  our  present  globe.  The  scope  of  his  intellect, 
and  the  majesty  of  his  rule,  are  seen  in  the  tranquil  order  and  ever- 
lasting silence  that  reign  through  the  fields  of  his  volition.  And  the 
spirit  that  animates  the  whole  is  like  that  of  the  Prophet  of  Nazareth ; 
the  thoughts  that  fly  upon  the  swift  light  throughout  creation,  charged 
with  fates  unnumbered,  are  like  the  healing  mercies  of  One  who 
passed  no  sorrow  by.  .  .  A  faith  that  spreads  around  and  within  the 
mind  a  Deity  thus  subUme  and  holy,  feeds  the  life  of  every  pure  affec- 
tion, and  presses  with  omnipotent  power  on  the  conscience ;  and  our 
only  prayer  is,  that  we  may  walk  as  children  of  such  light  1 " — ["  Studies 
of  Christianity " :  Boston  ed.,  1866:  p.  xx. 


NOTES  TO  LECTUKE  III. 

Note  I. :  page  70. — **  Buddha  liad  known  his  own  earlier  existences. 
The  tradition  of  the  Singhalese  ascribes  to  him  550  earlier  lives,  before 
Tie  saw  the  light  as  the  son  of  Quddhodana.  He  had  lived  as  a  rat  and 
a  crow,  as  a  frog  and  a  hare,  as  a  dog  and  a  pig,  twice  as  a  fish,  six 
i;imes  as  a  snipe,  four  times  as  a  golden  eagle,  four  times  as  a  peacock 
and  as  a  serpent,  ten  times  as  a  goose,  as  a  deer,  and  as  a  lion,  six  times 
as  an  elephant,  four  times  as  a  horse  and  as  a  bull,  eighteen  times  as  an 
ape,  four  times  as  a  slave,  three  times  as  a  potter,  thirteen  times  as  a 
merchant,  twenty-four  times  as  a  Brahman  and  as  a  prince,  fifty-eight 
times  as  a  king,  twenty  times  as  the  god  Indra,  and  four  times  as  Maha- 
*brahman.  Buddha  had  not  only  known  his  own  earlier  existences,  but 
those  of  all  other  living  creatures ;  and  this  supernatural  knowledge,  this 
•divine  omniscience,  was  ascribed  to  those  who  after  him  attained  the 
rank  of  Arhats." — [Duncker  :  "History  of  Antiquity";  London  ed., 
1880  :  Vol.  4  :  p.  487. 

II. :  p.  70. — The  "  Discussion  with  Townley,"  from  which  these  sen- 
tences are  quoted,  is  not  contained  in  the  "  Collected  Writings  "  of  Hol- 
yoake  [2  vols.]:  but  the  following,  from  his  essay  on  "The  Logic  of 
Death,"  appear  to  bear  the  same  significance: — 

"  Man  witnesses  those  near  and  dear  to  him  perish  before  his  eyes, 
and  despite  his  supplications.  He  walks  through  no  rose-water  world, 
and  no  special  Providence  smooths  his  path.  .  .  Man  is  weak,  and  a 
special  Providence  gives  him  no  strength — distracted,  and  no  counsel, — 
ignorant,  and  no  wisdom — in  despair,  and  no  consolation — in  distress, 
and  no  relief — in  darkness,  and  no  light.  The  existence  of  God,  there- 
fore, whatever  it  may  be  in  the  hypotheses  of  philosophy,  seems  not 
recognizable  in  daily  life.  It  is  in  vain  to  say,  *  God  governs  by  gen- 
eral laws.'  General  laws  are  inevitable  fate.  General  laws  are  atheis- 
tical. They  say,  practically,  '  we  are  without  God  in  the  world — man, 
look  to  thyself:  weak  though  thou  mayest  be.  Nature  is  thy  hope.' 
And  even  so  it  is.  Would  I  escape  the  keen  wind's  blast,  I  seek  shelter , 
from  the  yawning  waves  I  look  up,  not  to  Heaven,  but  to  naval  archi- 
tecture.    In  the  fire-damp,  Davy  is  more  to  me  than  the  Deity  of 

r409) 


410  APPENDIX. 

creeds.     All  nature  cries,  with  one  voice,  '  Science  is  the  Providence  o^' 
man.'"— [p.  7. 

III.:  p.  71. — "And  first  as  to  their  birth.  Their  ancestors  [of  the 
brave  Athenian  dead]  were  not  strangers,  nor  are  these  their  descend- 
ants sojourners  only,  whose  fathers  have  come  from  anotlier  countiy ;. 
but  they  are  the  children  of  the  soil,  dwelling  and  liviag  m  theif 
own  land.  And  the  country  which  brought  them  up  is  not  like  other 
countries,  a  step-mother  to  her  children,  but  their  own  tnie  moth- 
er :  she  bore  them,  and  nourished  them,  and  received  them,  and 
in  her  bosom  they  now  repose.  .  .  At  the  time  when  the  whole  earth 
was  sending  forth  and  creating  diverse  animals,  tame  and  wild,  this 
our  mother  was  free  and  pure  from  savage  monstei's,  and  out  of  all 
animals  selected  and  brought  forth  man,  who  is  superior  to  the  rest  in 
understanding,  and  who  alone  has  justice  and  religion.  And  a  great 
proof  that  she  was  the  mother  of  us  and  of  our  ancestors,  is  that  she 
provided  the  means  of  support  for  her  offspring.  .  .  And  when  she 
had  herself  nursed  them,  and  brought  them  up  to  manhood,  she  gave 
them  gods,  to  be  their  rulers  and  teachers." — [Plato:  Menexenus:  237-8. 

Euripides,  in  the  Ion,  refers  familiarly  to  the  '  earth-born  Athenian 
people,'  who  have  risen  to  great  renown.     (29,  589,  737.) 

"  The  Athenians  were  the  first  who  laid  aside  arms,  and  adopted  an 
easier  and  more  luxurious  way  of  life.  Quite  recently,  the  old-fash- 
ioned refinement  of  dress  still  lingered  among  the  elder  men  of  their 
richer  class,  who  wore  under-garments  of  linen,  and  bound  back  their 
hair  in  a  knot,  with  golden  clasps  in  the  form  of  grasshoppers ;  and  the 
same  customs  long  survived  among  the  elders  of  Ionia,  having  been, 
derived  from  their  Athenian  ancestors. " — [Thucydides  :  I. :  6. 

IV. :  p.  72. — "This  plant,  which  by  its  nature  should  be  akin  to  our 
conunon  milk-weed,  furnishes  like  the  latter  an  abundant  milky  juice^ 
which,  when  fermented,  possesses  intoxicating  qualities.  In  this  circum- 
stance, it  is  believed,  lies  the  explanation  of  the  whole  matter  [of  the  Soma- 
ritual].  The  simple-minded  Aryan  people,  whose  whole  religion  was  a 
worship  of  the  wonderful  powers  and  phenomena  of  nature,  had  no  sooner 
perceived  that  this  liquid  had  power  to  elevate  the  spirits  and  produce  a 
temporary  frenzy,  under  the  influence  of  which  the  individual  was 
prompted  to,  and  capable  of,  deeds  beyond  his  natural  powers,  than 
they  found  in  it  something  divine ;  it  was  to  their  apprehension  a  god, 
endowing  those  into  whom  it  entered  with  godlike  powers ;  the  plant 
which  afforded  it  became  to  them  the  king  of  plants ;  the  process  oi 
preparing  it  was  a  holy  sacrifice ;  the  instruments  used  therefor  were 
sacred.  .  .  Soma  is  there  addressed  [in  certain  hymns  of  the  Veda]  aa 
a  god,  in  the  highest  strains  of  adulation  and  veneration ;  all  powers  be- 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  411 

long  to  him;  all  blessings  are  besought  of  him,  as  his  to  bestow."— 
[Prof.  W.  D.  Whitney:  ''Oriental  and  Linguistic  Studies":  Firsi 
Series;  New  York  ed.,  1872  :  pp.  10-11. 

V. :  p.  74. — "  Every  one  will  admit  that  a  nature  thus  gifted,  and 
having  all  the  supposed  conditions  of  the  philosophic  nature  perfect,  ia 
a  plant  that  rarely  grows  among  men — there  are  not  many  of  them." — 
[Plato:  "Republic":  VI. :  491. 

"  It  is  clear,  then,  that  some  men  are  free  by  nature,  and  others  ai-e 
slaves ;  and  that,  in  the  case  of  the  latter,  the  lot  of  slavery  is  both  ad- 
vantageous and  just.  .  .  It  is  evident  that  some  persons  are  slaves, 
and  others  freemen,  by  the  appointment  of  nature  ;  and  also  that  in 
some  instances  there  are  two  distinct  classes,  for  the  one  of  whom  it  is 
expedient  to  be  a  slave,  and  for  the  other  to  be  a  master;  and  that  it  is 
right  and  just  that  some  should  be  governed,  and  that  others  should 
exercise  that  government  for  which  they  are  fitted  by  nature.  .  .  A 
slave  can  have  no  deliberative  faculty,  a  woman  but  a  weak  one,  a 
child  an  imperfect  one.  .  .  A  slave  is  one  of  those  things  which  are 
by  nature  what  they  are." — [Aristotle:  "  Politics " :  I. :  5,  6,  13. 

VI. :  p.  74. — "  If  any  habitation  there  be  for  the  shades  of  the  vir- 
tuous :  if ,  as  is  supposed  by  philosophers,  great  souls  are  not  extin- 
guished with  the  body:  may  you  [O  Agricola]  tranquilly  there  repose, 
and  call  us,  your  household,  from  weak  regret  and  womanish  lamenta- 
tions to  the  contemplation  of  your  virtues,  which  it  is  not  permissible 
either  to  mourn  for  or  bewail.  Let  us  adorn  thee  with  a  true  admira- 
tion, rather  than  with  any  fleeting  praises,  and,  if  nature  will  supply 
help,  with  our  eager  emulation." — [Tacitus  :  Agric.  Vit. :  XLVI. 

VII.:  p.  74. — "Since  the  Brahman  sprang  from  the  most  exalted 
part,  since  he  was  the  first-bom',  since  he  possesses  the  Veda,  he  is  by 
right  the  chief  of  the  whole  creation.  Him,  the  Being  who  exists  of 
himself,  produced  in  the  beginning  from  his  own  mouth :  that,  having 
performed  holy  rites,  he  might  present  clarified  butter  to  the  Gods, 
and  cakes  of  rice  to  the  progenitors  of  mankind,  for  the  preservation 
of  this  world.  What  created  being  then  can  surpass  Him,  with  whose 
mouth  the  Gods  of  the  firmament  continually  feast  on  clarified  butter, 
and  the  manes  of  ancestors  on  hallowed  cakes  ? " — ["Laws  of  Menu ": 
chap.  1:  93-5:  Works  of  Sir  W.  Jones;  London  ed.,  1807:  Vol.  7:  p.  . 
106. 

"The  Brahmans  are  nearest  to  Brahman  :  in  them  the  essence  of 
Brahman,  the  holy  spirit,  the  power  of  sanctification,  lives  in  greater 
force  than  in  the  rest;  they  emanated  from  Brahman  before  the  others; 
they  are  the  first-born  order.    .    .    Even  though  the  theory  of  the 


;**S 


412  APPENDIJT. 

World-soul  remained  unintelligible  to  the  many,  they  understood 
■that  the  Brahmans,  who  busied  themselves  with  sacrifice,  prayers,  and 
sacred  things,  stood  nearer  to  the  deity  than  they  did  ;  they  under- 
stood that  if  they  misconducted  themselves  toward  the  sacred  race,  or 
'disregarded  the  vocation  of  birth,  they  must  expect  endless  torments 
in  hell,  and  endless  regenerations  in  the  most  loathsome  woi-ms  and 
insects,  or  in  the  despised  class  of  the  Qudras — '  those  animals  in  hu- 
man form.'" — pDuncker:  "History  of  Antiquity";  London  ed.,  1880: 
Vol.  4:  pp.  134,  142-3. 

"  Caste  is  not  merely  the  symbol  of  Hinduism  ;  but,  according  to 
the  testimony  of  all  who  have  studied  it  on  the  spot,  it  is  its  strong- 
/hold.  It  is  this,  much  more  than  their  creeds,  which  attaches  the 
jnasses  to  these  vague  religions,  and  gives  them  such  astonishing  vi- 
tality."—[A.  Barth:  "  Religions  of  India " ;  Boston  ed.,  1882:  Preface, 
p.  xvii. 

VIII.:  p.  75. — "These  souls  [of  gods,  men,  and  animals]  go  forth 
from  Brahman  like  sparks  from  a  crackling  fire — a  metaphor  common 
in  the  book  of  the  law — they  are  of  one  essence  with  Brahman,  and 
parts  of  the  great  World-soul.  This  soul  is  in  the  world,  but  also  out- 
^side  and  above  it :  to  it  must  everything  return,  for  all  that  is  not 
-Brahman  is  impure,  without  foundation,  and  perishable.  .  .  There  is 
only  one  Being:  this  is  the  highest  soul,  and  besides  this  there  is  noth- 
ing; what  seems  to  exist  beyond  this  is  mere  illusion.  .  .  Nature  is 
■nothing  but  the  play  of  illusion,  appearing  in  splendour,  and  then  dis- 
appearing. .  .  The  movement  and  action  of  living  beings  is  not 
'Caused  by  the  sparks  of  Brahman  dwelling  in  them — for  Brahman  is 
consistently  regarded  as  single  and  at  rest — but  by  the  bodies  and 
senses,  which,  being  of  themselves  appearance  and  deception,  adopt 
and  reflect  the  deception  of  Maya." — [Duncker :  "History  of  Antiq- 
uity"; London  ed.,  1880:  Vol.  4:  pp.  "300-301. 

IX.  :  p.  75. — "Here  lay  the  secret  of  Buddha's  success.  He  ad- 
dressed himself  to  castes  and  outcasts.  He  promised  salvation  to  all; 
and  he  conmaanded  his  disciples  to  preach  his  doctrine  in  all  places 
and  to  all  inen.  A  sense  of  duty,  extending  from  the  narrow  limits  of 
the  house,  the  village,  and  the  country,  to  the  widest  circle  of  mankind , 
a  feeling  of  sympathy  and  brotherhood  towards  all  men;  the  idea,  in 
fact,  of  humanity,  was  in  India  first  pronounced  by  Buddha.  .  . 
*  Nothing  is  stable  on  earth,'  he  used  to  say,  *  nothing  is  real.  Life  is 
like  the  spark  produced  by  the  friction  of  wood.  It  is  lighted,  and  is 
extinguished, — we  know  not  whence  it  came  or  whither  it  goes.  It  is 
like  the  sound  of  a  lyre,  and  the  wise  man  asks  in  vain  from  whence 
►it  came  and  whither  it  goes.'  .   .  Difficult  as  it  seems  to  us  to  conceive 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III,  41  J> 

it,  Buddha  admits  of  no  real  cause  of  this  unreal  world.  He  denie* 
the  existence  not  only  of  a  Creator,  but  of  any  Absolute  Being.  Ac- 
cording to  the  metaphysical  tenets,  if  not  of  Buddha  himself,  at  least 
of  his  sect,  there  is  no  reality  anywhere,  neither  in  the  past  nor  in  the 
future.  True  wisdom  consists  in  perceiving  the  nothingness  of  all 
things,  and  in  a  desire  to  become  nothing,  to  be  blown  out,  to  enter 
mto  Nirvana.  Emancipation  is  obtained  by  total  extinction,  not  by 
absorption  into  Brahman,  or  by  a  recovery  of  the  soul's  true  estate. 
If  to  be  is  misery,  not  to  be  must  be  felicity;  and  this  felicity  is  the 
highest  reward  which  Buddha  promised  to  his  disciples." — [Max  Miil- 
ler:  "  Chips,"  etc. ;  New  York  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  1:  pp.  252,  207,  227-8. 

"  We  shall  confine  ourselves  to  the  remark  that  there  is  not  a  shadow 
of  evidence  that  the  social  problem  was  ever  agitated  among  the  semi- 
agricultural,  semi-pastoral  tribes,  in  the  midst  of  which  Buddha  spent 
his  life,  or  that  there  was  any  thought  of  disputing  the  right  of  the- 
Brahmans,  which  indeed  was  at  bottom  their  great  privilege,  to  be  the 
bearers  of  the  Veda,  and  by  claim  of  blood  to  be  the  ministers  of  cer- 
tain rehgious  rites.  .  .  One  fact  more  is  enough  to  discredit  this  the- 
ory [that  Buddhism  represented  a  reaction  against  the  regime  of  caste] : 
it  is  that  Buddhism,  at  the  time  when  it  was  dominant,  never  in  the 
slightest  interfered  with  caste  in  the  countries  where  it  happened  still 
to  exist ;  and  not  only  did  it  not  do  so — it  was  it  which  in  all  probabil- 
ity imported  caste  into  countries  where  it  did  not  yet  exist,  viz. ,  into 
the  Dekhan,  Ceylon,  the  isles  of  Sunda,  and  wherever  a  considerable 
number  of  Hindu  people  followed  in  its  train." — [Barth:  "Religions^ 
of  India";  Boston  ed.,  1882:  p.  125. 

Oldenburg  says,  as  quoted  by  Kuenen  :  "We  can  imderstand  how 
in  our  times  Buddha  should  have  had  the  role  assigned  to  him  of  a 
social  reformer,  who  broke  the  oppressive  chains  of  caste,  and  won  a 
place  for  the  poor  and  humble  in  the  spiritual  kingdom  which  he 
founded.  But  if  any  one  would  really  sketch  the  work  of  Buddha,  he 
must,  for  truth's  sake,  distinctly  deny  that  the  glory  of  any  such  deed, 
under  whatever  form  it  may  be  conceived,  really  belongs  to  him.  If 
we  permit  ourselves  to  speak  of  the  democratic  element  in  Buddhism, 
we  must  at  any  rate  keep  the  full  prominence  of  this  fact  before  our 
eyes :  that  the  idea  of  reforming  the  life  of  the  state,  in  any  direction 
whatsoever,  was  absolutely  foreign  to  the  circles  in  which  Buddhism 
arose." — ["National  and  Universal  Eeligions";  New  York  ed.,  1882: 
pp.  262-3. 

X. :  p.  77. — "  *  Shall  I  further  add  that  the  Hellenic  race  is  all  imited 
by  ties  of  blood  and  friendship,  and  alien  and  strange  to  the  barbari- 
ans?' 'Very  good,'  he  said.  *And  therefore  when  Hellenes  fight 
with  barbarians,  and  barbarians  with  Hellenes,  they  will  be  described^ 


414  APPENDIX. 

by  us  as  being  at  war  when  they  fight,  and  by  nature  in  a  state  ul 
war  ? '  "—[Plato :  "  Republic  " :  V. :  470. 

XI.:  p.  80. — "All  Brahminical  acts,  services,  sacraments,  imply  an 
effort  or  scheme  on  the  part  of  the  creature  to  raise  himself  to  God. 
All  Christian  acts,  services,  sacraments,  imply  that  God  has  sought 
for  the  creature,  that  He  might  raise  him  to  Himself.  The  differensea 
in  our  thoughts  of  God,  of  the  priest,  of  the  sacrifice,  all  go  back  to 
this  primary  difference." — [F.  D.  Maurice:  "  Religions  of  the  World  "; 
London  ed.,  1877:  pp.  183-4. 

XII. :  p.  80. — This  tone  of  questioning  doubt  in  the  ethnic  religions, 
contrasting  strongly  with  the  authcM'itative  instructions  of  the  Hebrew 
and  the  Christian  Scriptures,  is  well  illustrated  in  the  translation  of 
the  129th  hymn  of  the  tenth  book  of  the  Rig- Veda : — 
*'  Comes  this  spark  from  earth, 
'*  Piercing  and  all  pervading,  or  from  heaven  ? 
"  Then  seeds  were  sown,  and  mighty  powers  arose — 
*'  Nature  below,  and  power  and  will  above — 
*'  Who  knows  the  secret  ?  who  proclaimed  it  here, 
"  Whence,  whence,  this  manifold  creation  sprang  ? 
"  Tlie  gods  themselves  came  later  into  being — 
"  Who  knows  from  whence  this  great  creation  sprang  ? 
' '  He  from  whom  all  this  great  creation  came, 
*'  Whether  his  will  created  or  was  mute, 
"  The  Most  High  Seer  that  is  in  highest  heaven, 
"  He  knows  it — or  perchance  even  He  knows  not." 

[Max  MiUler:  "  Chips,"  etc. ;  New  York  ed.,  1881: 
Vol.  1:  p.  77. 
A  sentence  quoted  from  Dr.  Hang's  translation  of  the  Avesta  illus- 
trates the  same  thing: — 

"  That  I  will  ask  Tliee,  tell  me  it  right,  thou  living  God  1  Who  is 
holding  the  earth,  and  the  skies  above  it  ?  Who  made  the  waters,  and 
the  trees  of  the  field  ?  Who  is  in  the  winds  and  stonns  that  they  so 
quickly  run  ?  Who  is  the  Creator  of  the  good-minded  beings,  thou 
Wise?"— [Vol.  1:  pp.  123-4. 

XIII. :  p.  80. — "All  good  poets,  epic  as  well  as  lyric,  compose  their 
beautiful  poems  not  as  works  of  art,  but  because  they  are  inspired  and 
possessed  ;  .  .  for  they  tell  us  that  they  gather  their  strains  from 
honied  fountains,  out  of  the  gardens  and  dells  of  the  Muses  :  thither, 
like  the  bees,  they  wing  their  way ;  and  this  is  true.  For  the  poet  is  a 
light  and  winged  and  holy  thing,  and  there  is  no  invention  in  him 
until  he  has  been  inspired  and  is  out  of  his  senses,  and  the  mind  is  no 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  415 

longer  in  him :  when  he  has  not  attained  to  this  state,  he  is  powerless, 
■and  is  unable  to  utter  his  oracles.  .  .  For  in  this  way  the  God  would 
seom  to  indicate  to  us,  and  not  allow  us  to  doubt,  that  their  beautiful 
poems  are  not  human,  and  the  work  of  man,  but  divine,  and  the  work 
of  the  gods ;  and  that  the  poets  are  only  the  interpreters  of  the  gods 
by  whom  they  are  severally  possessed." — [Plato:  "Ion":  533,  534. 

"The  poet  [of  the  ancient  Epic] — like  the  prophet  whom  he  so  much 
resembles, — sings  under  heavenly  guidance,  inspired  by  the  goddess  to 
whom  he  has  prayed  for  her  assisting  impulse.  She  puts  the  word 
into  his  mouth,  and  the  incidents  into  his  mind  ;  he  is  a  privileged 
man,  chosen  as  her  organ,  and  speaking  from  her  revelations.  As  the 
Muse  grants  the  gift  of  song  to  whom  she  will,  so  she  sometimes  in  her 
anger  snatches  it  away,  and  the  most  consunmaate  human  genius  is 
then  left  silent  and  helpless." — [Grote:  "History  of  Greece":  London 
ed.,  1872:  Vol.  1:  p.  323. 

' '  The  god  himself  chooses  the  organs  of  his  communications :  and, 
as  a  sign  that  it  is  no  human  wisdom  and  art  which  reveals  the  divine 
will,  Apollo  speaks  through  the  mouth  of  feeble  girls  and  women. 
The  state  of  inspiration  is  by  no  means  one  of  specially  heightened 
powers,  but  the  human  being's  own  powers — nay,  own  consciousness — 
are,  as  it  were,  extinguished,  in  order  that  the  divine  voice  may  be 
heard  all  the  louder;  the  secret  communicated  by  the  god  resembles  a 
load  oppressing  the  breast  it  visits :  it  is  a  clairvoyance  from  which  no 
satisfaction  accrues  to  the  mind  of  the  seer.  This  seer  or  sibyl  is 
accordingly  not  herseK  capable  of  revelation ;  the  things  announced 
by  her  are  as  incomprehensible  to  her  as  to  her  hearers ;  so  that  an 
interpretation  is  necessary  to  enable  men  to  avail  themselves  of  the 
prophecy." — [Curtius  :  " History  of  Greece";  New  York  ed.,  1871: 
Vol.,  2:  p.  14. 

XIV. :  p.  81. — "Zeus,  or  the  king,  is  a  judge,  not  a  law-maker;  he 
issues  decrees  or  special  orders  to  settle  particular  disputes,  or  to  restrain 
particular  men. "  Poseidon,  though  second  in  power  only  to  Zeus,  ' '  has 
no  share  in  those  imperial  and  superintending  capacities  which  the 
Father  of  gods  and  men  exhibits."  To  Zeus  belong  "  the  commanding 
functions  of  the  supreme  God,  judicial  and  administrative,  extending 
both  over  gods  and  men." — [Grote  :  "Hist,  of  Greece";  London  ed., 
1872  :  Vol.  2:  p.  24  (note);  Vol.  1  :  pp.  52,  57. 

"The  conclusion  is  inevitable  that  the  decisive  precepts  which  we 
find  in  the  collection  [L9,ws  of  Menu]  must  have  been  put  together  and 
written  down  about  the  year  600  [B.C.].  The  introduction  [which  at' 
tributes  the  laws  to  the  Highest  being,  and  which  '  is  completely  ignored 
in  the  body  of  the  text ']  belongs  undoubtedly  to  a  later  period.  .  .  In 
any  case  it  is  clear  that  the  laws  of  Menu  are  the  oldest  book  of  law  in 


416  APPENDi:^. 

India,  in  their  contents  and  theory  of  law." — [Duncker  :    "Hist,  of' 
Antiquity";  London  ed.,  1880  :  Vol.  4  :  pp.  195,  196,  197  (note). 

"  This  book  gives  striking  evidence  of  the  mixture  characteristic  o\ 
the  Indian  nature ;  a  mixture  of  superstitious  fancy  and  keen  distinc- 
tion, of  vague  cloudiness  and  punctilious  systematising,  of  soaring 
theory  and  subtle  craft,  of  sound  sense  and  over-refinement  iu  reflec 
tion."— [p.  193. 

XV.:  p.  82. — The  whole  passage,  from  which  the  familiar  words 
quoted  in  the  text  are  taken,  is  singularly  lofty  and  impressive : — 

"  Two  things  fill  the  soul  with  ever  new  and  increasing  admiration 
and  awe,  the  oftener  and  the  more  steadily  one  holds  them  in  contem- 
plation: the  starry  Heavens  above  me,  and  the  moral  Law  within  me. 
I  need  not  search  for  or  imagine  either  of  them,  as  if  they  were  held  in 
darkness,  or  were  in  a  transcendental  sphere,  beyond  the  circle  of  my 
sight.  I  see  them  before  me,  and  associate  them  immediately  with  the 
consciousness  of  my  existence.  The  first  acts  upon  me  from  the  place 
which  I  occupy  in  the  exterior  world  of  the  senses,  and  extends  the 
connection  in  which  I  stand  into  immeasurable  vastness,  with  worlds 
upon  worlds,  and  systems  of  systems,  even  moreover  into  the  bound- 
less times  of  their  periodic  motion,  its  commencement  and  its  duration. 
The  second  begins  its  action  with  my  invisible  self,  my  own  personality, 
and  stations  me  in  a  world  which  has  true  infinitude,  but  which  is  only 
to  be  traced  by  the  intellect,  and  with  which — as  thereby  also  at  the 
same  time  with  all  yonder  visible  worlds — I  recognize  myself  as  in  a  con- 
nection not  merely  accidental,  but  universal  and  necessary." — [Kant : 
"SammtUche  Werke":  Leipzig  :  1867-8  :  Band  V. :  S.  167,  f. 

XVI. :  p.  82. — "In  the  moral  and  ritual  law,  as  in  a  shell,  is  hidden 
the  sweet  kernel  of  a  promise,  that  he  [God]  will  one  day  exhibit  the 
ideal  of  righteousness  in  living  form,  and  give  the  penitent  sinner  par- 
don for  all  his  transgressions,  and  the  power  to  fulfill  the  law.  With- 
out such  assurance  the  law  were  bitter  irony. " — [Schaff  :  ' '  History  ol 
Christian  Church";  New  York  ed.,  1882  :  Vol.  1 :  p.  67. 

XVII.:  p.  85. — "Let  there  be  one  word  concerning  all  marriages. 
Every  man  shall  follow,  not  after  the  marriage  which  is  most  pleasing 
to  himself,  but  after  that  which  is  most  beneficial  to  the  state.  .  . 
When  plays  are  ordered  with  a  view  to  children  having  the  same 
plays,  and  amusing  themselves  after  the  same  manner,  and  finding 
delight  in  the  same  playthings,  the  more  solemn  institutions  of  the 
state  are  allowed  to  remain  undisturbed.  .  He  who  changes  the  sports 
is  secretly  changing  the  manners  of  the  young,  and  making  the  old  to 
be  dishonored  among  them,  and  the  new  to  be  honored.    .    .   Let  our 


-       NOTBS  TO  LECTURE  III.  417 

decree  be  as  follows:— No  one,  in  singing  or  dancing,  shall  offend 
against  the  public  and  consecrated  models,  and  the  general  fashion 
among  the  youth,  any  more  than  he  would  offend  against  any  other 
law,  .  .  Shall  we  make  a  law  that  the  poet  shall  compose  nothing 
contiary  to  the  ideas  of  the  lawful,  or  just,  or  beautiful,  or  good,  which 
are  allowed  in  the  state  ?  Nor  shall  he  be  permitted  to  show  his  com- 
positions to  any  private  individuals,  until  he  shall  have  shown  them  to 
the  appointed  judges,  and  the  guardians  of  the  law,  and  they  are  satis- 
fied with  them.  .  .  Nor  shall  any  one  dare  to  sing  a  song  which  has 
not  been  approved  by  the  judgment  of  the  guardians  of  the  laws,  not 
even  if  his  strain  be  sweeter  than  the  songs  of  Thamyras  and  Orpheus ; 
but  only  such  poems  as  have  been  judged  sacred  and  dedicated  to  the 
Gods,  and  such  as  are  the  works  of  good  men,  works  of  praise  or  blame, 
which  have  been  deemed  to  fulfil  their  design  fairly. " — [Plato : ' '  Laws  " : 
VI.:  773  ;  VII.:  797,  800,  801  ;  VIII.:  829. 

XVIII. :  p.  85. — '^  We  here  see  a  broad  line  between  Christianity  and 
other  systems,  and  a  striking  proof  of  its  originality  and  elevation. 
Other  systems  were  framed  for  communities ;  Christianity  approached 
men  as  Individuals.  It  proposed,  not  the  glory  of  the  state,  but  the 
perfection  of  the  individual  mind.  So  far  from  being  contrived  to 
build  up  political  power,  Christianity  tends  to  reduce  and  gradually 
to  supplant  it,  by  teaching  men  to  substitute  the  sway  of  truth  and  love 
for  menace  and  force,  by  spreading  through  all  ranks  a  feeling  of 
brotherhood  altogether  opposed  to  the  spirit  of  domination,  and  by  es-^ 
tablishing  principles  which  nourish  self-respect  in  every  human  being,, 
and  teach  the  obscurest  to  look  with  an  undazzled  eye  on  the  most 
powerful  of  their  race."— [Dr.  Channing:  Works;  Boston  ed.,  1843: 
Vol.  3:  p.  865. 

XIX.:  p.  85. — "The  Fates  lead  us,  and  whatever  awaits  any  one 
in  life  the  first  hour  of  his  bu^th  has  determined.  One  cause  depends 
on  another  cause,  and  the  long  order  of  things  draws  with  it  all  events, 
whether  public  or  private." — [Seneca:  De  Provid. :  v. 

''In  the  same  way  as  the  water  of  rushing  streams  does  not  flow 
back  upon  itself,  nor  even  tarry  in  its  course,  because  4ihat  which  comes 
behind  pushes  forward  what  precedes :  so  the  eternal  series  of  Fate  gov- 
erns [or  rolls  on]  the  order  of  thmgs— whose  first  law  is  to  stand  im- 
movably by  what  is  decreed.  But  what  do  you  understand  Fate  to  be  ? 
I  consider  it  that  necessity  of  aU  things  and  actions  which  no  force 
may  break.  If  you  think  that  this  is  to  be  prevailed  upon  by  sacrifices, 
and  by  offering  the  white  head  of  a  lamb,  you  do  not  imderstand 
Divine  things.  "-[Nat.  Quaest. :  II.:  35,  36. 

XX. :  p.  86.— "  If  some  aspiring  party  of  this  day,  the  great  Orleans 
27 


418  APPENBIJ^, 

family,  or  a  branch  of  the  Hohenzollern,  wishing  to  found  a  kingdom, 
were  to  profess,  as  their  only  weapon,  the  practice  of  virtue,  they  would 
not  startle  us  more  than  it  startled  a  Jew  eighteen  hundred  years  ago, 
to  be  told  that  his  glorious  Messiah  was  not  to  fight,  but  simply  to 
preach.  It  is  indeed  a  thought  so  strange,  both  in  its  prediction  and  in 
its  fulfilment,  as  urgently  to  suggest  to  us  that  some  Divine  Power 
went  with  him  who  conceived  and  proclaimed  it." — [J.H.  Newman: 
•*  Grammar  of  Assent " :  New  York  ed.,  1870:  p.  444. 

XXI. :  p.  86. — "  Sprung  for  the  most  part  from  a  primitive  worship 
of  natural  forces,  repeatedly  transformed  by  popular  imagination  and 
admixture  of  every  kind,  pagan  religions  were  limited  by  their  own 
past.  It  was  impossible  to  get  out  of  them,  what  was  never  in  them, 
— theism,  edification." — pElenan  :  "Hibbert  Lectures";  London  ed., 
1880:  p.  33. 

"  There  was  no  exposition  of  doctrine  in  the  mysteries,  and  no  course 
of  dogmatical  instruction;  the  address  was  not  made  to  the  under- 
standing, but  to  the  sense,  the  imagination,  and  the  divining  instincts 
of  the  initiated.  .  .  For  the  whole  was  a  drama,  the  prelude  to  which 
consisted  in  purifications,  sacrifices,  and  injunctions  with  regard  to  the 
behaviour  to  be  observed.  The  adventures  of  certain  deities,  their  suf- 
ferings and  joys,  their  appearance  on  earth,  and  their  relations  to  man- 
kind, their  death,  or  descent  to  the  nether  world,  their  return,  or  their 
rising  again, — all  these,  as  symbolizing  the  life  of  nature,  were  repre- 
sented in  a  connected  series  of  theatrical  scenes.  .  .  The  priest-class 
had  no  deposit  of  religious  doctrine,  either  to  guard  or  to  propound ; 
for  amongst  the  Greeks  generally  there  was  nothing  taught  about  re- 
ligion, and  the  legends  of  the  gods  were  handed  down  from  mouth  to 
mouth,  or  by  the  universal  i-eading  or  recitation  of  the  works  of  the 
poets.  .  .  No  sort  of  intellectual  capacity,  or  special  education,  or 
training  beforehand,  was  required  of  the  priest.  It  is  highly  charac- 
teristic that  Plutarch,  while  specifying  the  various  classes  of  persons 
from  whom  a  knowledge  of  religious  things  might  be  gained,  should 
make  no  mention  of  priests,  though  he  does  of  poets,  lawgivers,  and 
philosophers ;  quite  m  keeping  with  which  Dio  Chrysostom  reckons  as 
sources  of  religi6n,  besides  the  universal  sense  of  it  which  is  conmaon 
among  men, — poets,  lawgivers,  sculptors  and  painters,  and  lastly  phi- 
losophers ;  and  so  to  him  also  it  never  occurred  that  advice  on  religious 
matters  could  be  obtained  from  priests.  Therefore  it  is  not  to  be  won- 
dered at  that  Plato  should  not  have  thought  of  requiring  any  single 
intellectual  qualification  from  the  priests  of  his  ideal  Eepublic." — 
Pollmger:  "The  Gentile  and  the  Jew";  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  1; 
pp.  126,  203,  210. 

XXII. :  p.  86.— '  Thornton  observes  [History  of  China],  *  It  may  ex- 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  4 19 

cite  jurprisG,  and  probably  incredulity,  to  state  that  the  golden  rule  of 
our  Saviour,  Do  unto  others  as  you  would  that  they  should  do  unto 
you — which  Mr.  Locke  designates  as  the  most  unshaken  rule  of  mor 
ality,  and  foundation  of  all  social  virtue, — had  been  inculcated  by  Con- 
fucius, almost  in  the  same  words,  four  centuries  before.'  I  have  taken 
notice  of  this  fact  in  reviewing  both  The  Great  Learning  and  The  Doc- 
trine of  the  Mean.  I  would  be  far  from  grudging  a  tribute  of  admira- 
tion to  Confucius  for  it.  .  .  Tsze-kung  asks  if  there  be  one  word  whicli 
may  serve  as  a  rule  of  practice  for  all  one's  life,  and  is  answered :  '  Is 
not  Reciprocity  such  a  word  ?  What  you  do  not  want  done  to  your- 
self, do  not  do  to  others.'  .  .  When  a  comparison,  however,  is  drawn 
between  it  and  the  rule  laid  down  by  Christ,  it  is  proper  to  call  atten- 
tion to  the  positive  form  of  the  latter, — 'all  things  whatsoever  ye 
would  that  men  should  do  unto  you,  do  ye  even  so  to  them.'  The  les- 
son of  the  Gospel  commands  men  to  do  what  they  feel  to  be  right  and 
good.  It  requires  them  to  commence  a  coui*se  of  such  conduct,  with- 
out regard  to  the  conduct  of  othei'S  to  themselves.  The  lesson  of  Con  • 
fucius  only  forbids  men  to  do  what  they  feel  to  be  wrong  and  hurtful. 
So  far  as  the  point  of  priority  is  concerned,  moreover,  Christ  adds, 
'  This  is  the  law  and  the  prophets.'  The  maxim  was  to  be  found  sub- 
stantially in  the  earlier  revelations  of  God. 

' '  But  the  worth  of  the  two  maxims  depends  on  the  intention  of  the 
enunciators  bi  regard  to  their  application.  .  .  Confucius  delivered  his 
rule  to  his  countrymen  only,  for  their  guidance  in  their  relations  [the 
five  relations  of  society]  of  which  I  have  had  so  much  occasion  to  speak. 
The  rule  of  Christ  is  for  man  as  man,  having  to  do  with  other  men,  all 
mth  hunself  on  the  same  platform,  as  the  children  and  subjects  of  the 
one  God  and  Father  in  heaven."  —  [Legge  :  "Chinese  Classics": 
Proleg.  Ch.  v.:  Sec.  II:  §  8. 

"  As  a  mother,  even  at  the  risk  of  her  own  life,  protects  her  son,  her 
only  son,  so  let  a  man  cultivate  good- will  without  measm^e — unhindered 
love  and  friendliness  toward  the  whole  world,  above,  below,  around." 
--[Buddhist  doctrine  of  Duty.]  Rhys  Davids:  Lects.  on  "Indian 
Buddhism";  New  York  ed.,  1882:  p.  111. 

"The  moral  code  [of  Buddliism]  becomes  comparatively  powerless 
for  good,  as  it  is  destitute  of  all  real  authority.  Gotama  taught  the 
propriety  of  certain  observances,  because  all  other  Buddhas  had  done 
the  same ;  but  something  more  is  required  before  man  can  be  restrained 
from  vice,  and  preserved  in  the  way  of  purity.  .  .  There  is  properly 
no  law.  The  Buddhist  can  take  upon  himself  certain  obligations,  or 
resolve  to  keep  certain  precepts ;  as  many  or  as  few  as  he  pleases ;  and 
for  any  length  of  time  he  pleases.  It  is  his  own  act  that  makes  them 
binding ;  and  not  any  objective  authority.  Even  when  he  takes  the 
obligations,  there  is  this  convenient  clause  in  the  form  that  he  repeats 


420  APPENDIX. 

to  the  priest :  '  I  embrace  the  five  (or  eight)  precepts,  to  obey  them 
severally,  as  far  as  I  am  able,  from  this  time  forward.'  The  power  ol 
the  precepts  is  further  diminished,  as  they  are  repeated  ui  Pali,  a  lan- 
gnage  seldom  miderstood  by  the  lay  devotee." — [R.  Spence  Hardy: 
•'Manual  of  Buddhism";  London  ed.,  1880:  pp.  525-6. 

''The  question  was  once  put  to  him  [Aristotle]  how  we  ought  to  be- 
have to  our  friends ;  and  the  answer  he  gave  was,  '  As  we  should  wish 
our  friends  to  behave  to  us.' " — [Diogenes  Laertius:  V. :  XI. 

' '  Socrates :  '  Are  we  to  rest  assured,  in  spite  of  the  opinion  of  the 
many,  and  in  spite  of  consequences  whether  better  or  worse,  of  the 
truth  of  what  was  then  said,  that  injustice  is  always  an  evil  and  a  dis- 
honor to  him  who  acts  unjustly?'  'Yes.'  'Then  we  must  do  no 
wrong?'  'Certainly  not.'  'Nor  when  injured  injure  in  return,  as 
the  many  imagine ;  for  we  must  injure  no  one  at  all.  .  .  Then  we 
ought  not  to  retaliate  or  render  evil  for  evil  to  any  one,  whatever  evil 
we  may  have  suffered  from  him.  .  .  This  is  the  voice  which  I  seem  to 
hear  murmuring  in  my  ears,  like  the  sound  of  the  flute  in  the  ears  of 
the  mystic  ;  that  voice,  I  say,  is  humming  in  my  ears,  and  prevents 
me  from  hearing  any  other.' " — [Plato:  "  Crito":  49,  54. 

XXIII,  :  p.  89.  —  "Those  blessed  women,  whose  hearts  God  had 
sown  deepest  with  the  orient  pearl  of  faith ;  they  w^ho  ministered  to 
him  in  his  wants,  washed  his  feet  with  tears  of  penitence,  and  wiped 
them  with  the  hairs  of  their  heads, — ^was  it  in  vain  he  spoke  to  them  ? 
.  .  His  word  swayed  the  multitude  as  pendent  vines  swmg  in  the 
summer  wind ;  as  the  Spirit  of  God  moved  on  the  watei's  of  chaos,  and 
said,  'Let  there  be  light,'  and  there  was  light.  No  doubt  many  a 
rude  fisherman  of  Galilee  heard  his  words  with  a  heart  bounding  and 
scarce  able  to  keep  in  his  bosom,  went  home  a  new  man,  with  a  legion 
of  angels  in  his  breast,  and  from  that  day  lived  a  life  divine  and  beau- 
tiful. .  .  To  them  the  word  of  Jesus  must  have  sounded  divine ;  like 
the  music  of  their  home  sung  out  in  the  sky,  and  heard  in  a  distant 
land,  beguiling  toil  of  its  weai'iness,  pain  of  its  sting,  affliction  of  de- 
spair."— [Theodore  Parker  :  "  Discoiirse  of  Eeligion  " ;  Boston  ed.,  1842 . 
pp.  305-308. 

XXrV. :  p.  90. — "Upon  an  exact  and  strict  comparison  of  a  man's  self 
with  the  moral  law  (its  holiness  and  rigor),  true  humility  must  infal- 
libly result;  but  from  the  very  circumstance  that  we  can  know  our- 
selves capable  of  such  an  inward  legislation,  and  that  the  physical  man 
feels  himseK  compelled  to  stand  in  awe  of  the  ethical  man  in  liis  own 
person,  there  results  also,  at  the  same  time,  a  feeling  of  exaltation,  and 
the  highest  possible  self-estimation.    .   .   The  summary  of  the  Moral 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III,  421 

Ijaw  does,  therefore,  like  every  other  precept  in  the  Gospel,  represent  th« 
perfection  of  the  moral  sentiment,  in  an  ideal  of  holiness  not  attainable 
by  any  creature,  but  which  is  the  archetype  toward  which  it  behooyea 
us  to  approximate,  exerting  ourselves  thitherward  in  an  unbroken  and 
a  perpetual  progression.  .  .  Verily,  it  can  be  nothing  less  than  what 
advances  man,  as  part  of  the  physical  system,  above  himseK,  con- 
necting him  with  an  order  of  thmgs  unapproached  by  sense." — [Kant: 
*'Metaphysic  of  Ethics":  (Semple's  trans.) ;  Edinburgh  ed. ,  1869:  pp. 
243,  116,  120. 

XXV. :  p.  91. — "When  I  [Socrates]  do  not  know  whether  death  is  a 
good  or  an  evil,  why  should  I  propose  a  penalty  [another  one]  which 
would  certainly  be  an  evil  ?  .  .  Let  us  reflect  in  another  way,  and  we 
shall  see  that  there  is  great  reason  to  hope  that  death  is  a  good ;  for  one 
of  two  things :  either  death  is  a  state  of  nothingness  and  utter  uncon- 
sciousness, or,  as  men  say,  there  is  a  change  and  migration  of  the  soul 
from  this  world  to  another.  Now  if  you  suppose  that  there  is  no  con- 
sciousness, but  a  sleep  like  the  sleep  of  him  who  is  undisturbed  even  by 
the  sight  of  dreams,  death  will  be  an  unspeakable  gain.  .  .  But  if 
death  be  the  journey  to  another  place,  and  there,  as  men  say,  all  the 
dead  are,  what  good,  0  my  friends  and  judges,  can  be  greater  than 
this  ?  .  .  The  hour  of  departure  has  arrived,  and  we  go  our  ways — 
I  to  die,  and  you  to  live.  Which  is  better,  God  only  knows." — [Plato: 
"Apology":  37,  40,  42. 

XXVI. :  p.  91. — "All  experience  shows  that  if  we  would  have  pure 
knowledge  of  anything  we  must  be  quit  of  the  body,  and  the  soul  in 
herself  must  behold  all  things  in  themselves ;  then  I  suppose  that  we 
shall  attain  that  which  we  desire,  and  of  which  we  say  that  we  are 
lovere,  and  that  is  wisdom:  not  while  we  live,  but  after  death,  as  the 
argument  shows ;  for  if  while  in  company  with  the  body  the  soul  can- 
not have  pure  knowledge,  one  of  two  things  seems  to  follow — either 
knowledge  is  not  to  be  attained  at  all,  or,  if  at  all,  after  death.  For 
then,  and  not  till  then,  the  soul  will  be  in  herself  alone,  and  without 
the  body.  .  .  Then  the  foolishness  of  the  body  will  be  cleared  away, 
and  we  shall  be  pure,  and  hold  converse  with  other  pure  souls,  and 
know  of  ourselves  the  clear  light  everywhere ;  and  this  is  surely  the 
light  of  truth."— [Plato:  "Phaedo":  66,  67. 

This  doctrine  is  connected,  however,  with  that  of  the  preexistence  of 
the  soul : — 

.  "There  can  be  no  doubt  that  if  these  absolute  ideas  [of  beauty,  good- 
ness, and  essence  in  general]  existed  before  we  were  bom,  then  our 
Bouls  must  have  existed  before  we  were  bom ;  and  if  not  the  ideas,  then 
not  the  souls.    .    .   If  the  soul  existed  before  birth,  and  in  coming  to 


422  APPENDIX. 

life  and  being  born  can  be  born  only  from  death  and  dying,  must  sh« 
not  after  death  continue  to  exist,  since  she  has  to  be  born  again  ?  .  . 
Like  children,  you  are  haunted  with  a  fear  that  when  the  soul  leaves 
the  body,  the  wind  may  really  blow  her  away  and  scatter  her:  espe- 
cially if  a  man  should  happen  to  die  in  stormy  weather,  and  not  when 
the  sky  is  calm."— ["  Phaedo  "  :  76,  77. 

XXVII. :  p.  91. — "Are  we,  then,  to  call  no  other  man  happy  as  long 
as  he  lives,  but  is  it  necessary,  as  Solon  says,  to  look  to  the  end  ?  But 
if  we  must  lay  down  this  rule,  is  he  then  happy  when  he  is  dead  ?  Or 
is  this  altogether  absurd,  especially  in  us  who  assert  happiness  to  be  a 
khid  of  energy  ?  .  .  What  sort  of  fearful  things,  then,  has  the  cour- 
ageous man  to  do  with  ?  the  gi^eatest :  for  no  man  is  more  able  than  he 
to  endure  terrible  things,  but  death  is  the  most  terrible  of  all  things ; 
for  it  is  a  limit ;  and  beyond  it,  it  is  thought  that  to  the  dead  there  is 
nothing,  either  good  or  bad."— [Aristotle:  Nic.  Ethics  :  I. :  10;  III. :  6. 

XXVIII.:  p.  91. — "There  are  some  who  conceive  Death  to  be  the 
departure  of  the  soul  from  the  body.  There  are  others  who  think  that 
no  such  departure  takes  place,  but  that  together  soul  and  body  perish, 
and  the  soul  is  extinguished  with  the  body.  They  who  think  that  the 
soul  departs — some  of  them  believe  it  to  be  immediately  dissolved, 
others  that  it  continues  to  exist  for  a  long  time,  and  others  still  that  it 
lasts  forever.  Yet  further,  there  is  a  great  difference  of  opinion  as  to 
what  the  soul  itself  may  be,  or  where  it  resides,  or  whence  it  comes. 
.  .  '  I  see  that  you  are  high  in  contemplation,  and  desii'e  to  flit  into 
the  heaven.'  'I  hope  it  maybe  that  that  shall  happen  to  us.  But 
grant,  what  they  insist  upon,  that  souls  do  not  continue  :  I  see  our- 
selves deprived,  if  that  should  be  the  case,  of  the  hope  of  a  happier  life.* 
*  But  what  of  evil  does  that  opinion  present  ?  Admit  that  the  soul  per- 
ishes, as  well  as  the  body.  Is  there  any  distress,  or  any  feeling  what- 
ever, after  death,  in  the  body  ?  .  .  Not  indeed,  therefore,  in  the  soul 
remains  any  sense.  The  soul  is  nowhere ;  where  then  is  the  evil,  since 
there  is  no  third  subsistence '  [besides  the  body  and  the  soul]  ?  .  .  For* 
if  that  final  day  does  not  bring  extinction,  but  only  change  of  abode 
what  can  be  more  desirable  ?  But  if,  on  the  other  hand,  it  puts  an  end 
to  us,  and  utterly  destroys,  what  can  be  better  than  in  the  midst  of  the 
hard  labors  of  life  to  fall  asleep,  and  so  shutting  the  eyes  to  become  un- 
conscious in  an  eternal  slumber  ?" — [Cicero:  Tuscul.  Quaest.  I. :  9,  34,  49. 
Any  higher  thought  of  the  soul  naturally  approached  pantheism : — 
"Strive  forward  then  [in  your  ancestors'  steps]  said  he  [Afi-icanus], 
and  habitually  consider  this,  not  that  thou  art  mortal,  but  only  this 
body :  for  thou  art  not  that  which  the  outward  form  presents  to  us ; 
but  the  mind  of  each  one  that  is  himself,  not  that  figure  which  can  be 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  423 

pointed  out  by  the  finger.  Know  then  thyself  to  be  a  god ;  if  indeed 
that  be  god  which  flourishes,  which  feels,  which  remembers,  which 
foresees,  which  thus  rules,  and  regulates,  and  moves  the  body  over 
which  it  is  set,  as  the  chief  god  is  over  the  world  itself.  And  as  that 
eternal  god  on  every  hand  moves  the  mortal  world,  so  the  ever-dui'ing 
soul  moves  the  frail  body." — [De  Republica  :  VI. :  17. 

XXIX. :  p.  91. — In  the  letter  written  by  Servius  Sulpicius  to  Cicero 
after  the  death  of  Tullia,  he  seeks  to  associate  all  the  arguments  which 
philosophy  could  suggest  to  comfort  the  eloquent  statesman,  his  friend, 
in  his  great  grief:  but  these  are  drawn  wholly  from  the  public  calami- 
ties out  of  which  Tullia  had  passed  by  death,  from  the  general  lot  of 
ruin  and  decay  in  which  cities  and  states,  as  well  as  persons,  were  in- 
volved, from  the  fact  that  she  must  at  any  rate  have  died  ere  long, 
etc. ,  etc.  His  only  reference  to  a  future  life  is  in  the  suggestion  that 
if  those  in  the  land  of  shadows  retain  any  feeling  about  what  here 
takes  place,  she  would  herself  wish  her  father  to  moderate  his  grief. 
Cicero,  in  reply,  admits  the  wisdom  and  weight  of  his  friend's  sugges- 
tions, and  confesses  that  he  should  feel  it  a  meanness  not  to  bear  his 
calamity  as  Sulpicius  advises ;  but  he  gives  no  hint  of  any  expectation, 
for  himseK  or  his  daughter,  of  a  life  after  death. — [See  Epist.  ad.  Di- 
vers. :  IV. :  5,  6. 

XXX.  :  p.  91. — The  entire  uncertainty  of  Seneca  concerning  the 
state  of  the  soul  after  death  is  illustrated  in  many  passages : — 

"He  has  fled  away  wholly,  leaving  nothing  of  himself  in  the 
world,  and  has  altogether  departed  from  it ;  .  .  carried  to  highest 
places,  where  he  has  intercourse  with  the  happy  souls,  and  where  the 
sacred  company  has  received  him,  the  Scipios,  Catos,  who  have  been 
at  any  rate  despisers  of  this  life,  and  who  are  now  set  in  freedom  by 
the  blessing  of  death.  .  .  Death  is  both  the  solution  and  the  termina- 
tion of  all  griefs  :  beyond  which  our  evils  do  not  extend  :  which  re- 
places us  in  the  tranquillity  in  which  we  lay  before  we  were  born.  If 
any  one  will  be  sorrowful  for  the  dead,  then  let  him  be  sorrowful  also 
for  those  who  are  not  bom.  Death  is  neither  a  good  nor  an  evil.  For 
that  may  be  either  good  or  evil  which  is  in  itself  anything ;  but  really 
what  in  itself  is  nothing,  and  reduces  all  things  to  nothtagness,  con- 
ducts us  to  no  fortune.  .  .  And  when  the  time  shall  come  at  whicli 
the  world  shall  extinguish  itself,  that  it  may  be  renewed,  these  things 
[forces  and  forms  of  nature]  shall  destroy  each  other  by  their  own 
energy,  and  stars  shall  rush  against  stars,  and,  all  material  things  be- 
ing set  on  fire,  whatever  now  shines  by  reason  of  its  skillful  adjustment 
shall  be  consumed  in  one  flame.  We  also,  that  are  blessed  souls,  and 
Allotted  to  eternity,  when  it  shall  seem  good  to  God  to  again  disturb 


4:24  APPENDIX. 

these  things,  all  falling  in  confusion  together,  we  then,  even  as  a  small 
addition  to  this  immense  ruin,  shall  be  returned  into  our  ancient  ele- 
ments."—[Ad.  Marc.  Consol. :  25,  19,  2Q. 

' '  Death  is  non-existence  ;  that  which  was  before  birth  :  and  what 
that  may  be,  now  I  know — that  will  be  after  life  which  was  befoi-e  it. 
If  a  man  feel  anything  of  torment  on  account  of  this,  it  must  needs 
follow  that  the  same  had  been  felt  before  we  were  brought  forth  into 
the  light ;  but  then  we  had  no  consciousness  of  vexation.  I  pray  you, 
would  you  not  count  a  man  a  great  fool  if  he  should  think  it  a  worse 
condition  for  a  candle  when  it  is  blown  out  than  that  had  been  be- 
fore it  was  lighted  ?  We,  in  like  manner,  are  lighted,  and  again  extin- 
guished ;  and  in  the  interval  we  suffer  somewhat.  But  in  either  of 
the  other  conditions  is  the  highest  security." — [Epist. :  LIV. 

XXXI. :  p.  91. — "Man  knows  nothing  without  instruction;  he  can- 
not speak,  nor  walk,  nor  eat ;  and,  in  short,  he  can  do  nothing  spon- 
taneously, at  the  dictate  of  nature,  except  weep.  Therefore  many 
there  have  been  who  have  thought  it  the  best  thing  not  to  have  been 
bom,  or,  if  born,  as  quickly  as  possible  to  be  annihilated.  .  .  To  all 
men,  after  their  last  day,  remains  the  same  state  which  was  before 
their  first  day ;  nor  is  there  after  death  any  other  sensation  left,  either 
in  body  or  in  soul,  than  there  was  before  birth.  But  this  same  vanity 
of  ours  projects  itself  even  into  the  future,  and  in  the  very  hour  of 
death  falsely  represents  to  itself  a  future  life ;  at  one  time  conferring 
upon  us  an  immortality  of  the  soul ;  at  another,  a  transmigration ;  at 
another,  a  consciousness  of  lower  regions  ;  etc.  .  .  All  these  are  the 
inventions  of  puerile  raving,  and  of  that  mortality  which  is  so  eager 
never  to  cease.  .  .  What  absolute  madness  is  this,  to  think  that  life 
may  re-commence  after  death  !  .  .  Nor  can  he  [God]  give  immortal- 
ity to  mortals,  or  recall  into  life  those  who  are  dead ;  nor  can  he  bring 
it  to  pass  that  one  who  has  once  lived  shall  not  have  lived ;  or  that  he 
who  has  borne  honors  shall  not  have  borne  them  ;  nor  has  he  any 
prerogative  over  past  events,  except  that  of  bringing  oblivion  upon 
them."— [Pliny:  Nat.  Hist.:  Vn. :  1,  56:  II.:  5. 

XXXII. :  p.  91.—"  For  it  is  unknown  what  may  be  the  nature  of 
the  soul ;  whether  it  may  be  bom  with  us,  or  on  the  other  hand  may 
be  introduced  [after  birth]  into  those  born ;  and  whether  it  may  perish 
with  us,  dissolved  by  death,  or  may  visit  the  shades  of  Orcus,  and  its 
vast  pools ;  or  whether,  by  divine  arrangement,  it  may  insert  itseK  into 
other  animals,  as  our  Ennius  sang,  who  first  brought  a  crown  of  per- 
ennial leaf  from  pleasant  Helicon." — [Lucretius:  De  Her.  Nat.:  1. • 
113-120. 

"Death,  therefore,  is  nothing,  and  does  not  in  the  least  concern  us, 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  425 

since  the  very  nature  of  the  soul  is  to  be  regarded  as  mortal.  .  .. 
Thus  we  shall  no  longer  exist,  when  the  separation  shall  have  taken 
place  of  the  body  and  the  soul,  of  which  we  are  now  joined  together 
in  unity.  You  may  understand  that  to  us,  who  shall  not  then  be, 
nothing  whatever  will  be  able  to  happen,  or  to  move  any  feeling ;  not 
if  the  earth  were  to  be  mingled  with  the  sea,  and  the  sea  with  the 
heavens."— [III. :  842-854. 

XXXIII. :  p.  91. — Horace  expresses  no  doubt  the  common  feeling 
of  his  day,  in  his  familiar  lines : — 

' '  Pale  Death,  with  impartial  foot,  knocks  at  the  hovels  of  the  poor 
and  the  palaces  of  kings.  O  happy  Sextius,  the  brief  sum  of  life  for- 
bids us  to  commence  anything  far-rea<;hing.  Presently  Night  will  op- 
press thee,  and  the  ghosts  celebrated  in  fable,  and  the  cheerless  house 
of  Pluto."— [L.  I.:  Car.  4:  13-17. 

"We  are  all  pushed  in  the  same  direction:  later  or  more  quickly 
the  forth-coming  lot  of  all  is  shaken  in  the  urn,  embarking  us  in  Char- 
on's boat,  for  eternal  exile."— [L.  II. :  Car.  3:  25-28. 

The  practical  philosophy  of  the  best  among  the  Greeks  was  probably 
that  expressed  by  Euripides,  in  lines  quoted  by  Symonds  in  his  "Stud- 
ies of  the  Greek  Poets  " : 

*  Let  those  who  live  do  right  ere  death  deseendeth  ; 
The  dead  are  dust ;  mere  nought  to  nothing  tendeth.' 

[Second  Series;  London  ed.,  1876:  p.  291. 

XXXIV. :  p.  91. — The  doctrine  of  Epictetus  concerning  man's  rela- 
tionship to  God,  seems  a  noble  one : — 

"  If  a  man  should  be  able  to  accept  this  doctrine,  as  he  ought,  that 
we  are  all  sprung  from  God  in  an  especial  manner,  and  that  God  is 
the  Father  both  of  men  and  gods,  I  suppose  that  he  would  never  have 
any  ignoble  or  mean  thoughts  about  himself.  .  .  Why  should  not 
such  a  man  call  himself  a  citizen  of  the  world  ?  why  not  a  son  of  God  ? 
a,nd  why  should  he  be  afraid  of  anything  which  happens  among 
men  ?  "—[I. :  3,  9. 

But  respecting  the  future  life  of  the  soul  his  words  are  full  of  sor- 
rowful darkness : — 

' '  He  [God]  gives  the  signal  for  retreat,  opens  the  door,  and  says  to 
you.  Go  !  Go  whither  ?  To  nothing  terrible,  but  to  the  place  from 
which  you  came ;  to  your  friends  and  kinsmen,  to  the  elements ;  what 
there  was  in  you  of  fire,  goes  to  fire;  of  earth,  to  earth;  of  air,  to  air; 
of  water,  to  water  ;  no  Hades,  nor  Acheron,  nor  Cocytus,  nor  Pyri- 
phlegethon,  but  all  is  full  of  gods  and  daemons.  When  a  man  has 
such  things  to  think  on,  and  sees  the  sun,  the  moon  and  stars,  and 
enjoys  earth  and  sea,  he  is  not  solitary  nor  even  helpless." — [111. :  13^ 


426  APPENDIX. 

XXXV. :  p.  91. — Plutarch  inferred  the  probability  of  a  futTirtj  life 
from  the  assumed  propriety  of  worship  to  the  gods : — 

"And  therefore,  if  you  please,  not  concerning  ourselves  with  othei 
deities,  let  us  go  no  further  than  the  God  Apollo,  whom  we  here  call 
our  own ;  see  whether  it  is  likely  that  he,  knowing  that  the  souls  of 
the  deceased  vanish  away  like  clouds  and  smoke,  exhaling  from  our 
bodies  like  a  vapor,  requires  that  so  many  propitiations,  and  such  great 
honors,  be  paid  to  the  dead,  and  such  veneration  be  given  tx)  deceased 
persons,  merely  to  delude  and  cozen  his  believers !  And  therefore,  for 
my  part,  I  will  never  deny  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  till  somebody 
or  other,  as  they  say  Hercules  did  of  old,  shall  be  so  daring  as  to  come 
and  take  away  the  prophetical  tripod,  and  so  quite  ruin  and  destroy 
the  oracle."— ["  Morals":  Boston  ed.,  1874  :  Vol.  4  :  p.  169. 

"What  means  all  this  [the  death  of  distinguished  persons]?  Thou 
hast  embarked,  thou  hast  made  the  voyage,  thou  art  come  to  shore : 
Get  out.  If  indeed  to  another  life,  there  is  no  want  of  gods,  even  there. 
But  if  to  a  state  without  sensation,  thou  wilt  cease  to  be  held  by  pains 
and  pleasures,  and  to  be  a  slave  to  the  vessel,  which  is  as  much  inferior 
as  that  which  serves  it  is  superior ;  for  the  one  is  intelligence  and  deity, 
and  the  other  is  earth  and  corruption.  .  .  As  here  the  mutation  of  these 
Pruned]  bodies  after  a  certain  continuance,  whatever  it  may  be,  and 
their  dissolution,  make  room  for  other  dead  bodies ;  so  the  souls  which 
are  removed  into  the  air,  after  subsisting  for  some  time,  are  trans- 
muted, and  diffused,  and  assume  a  fiery  nature  by  being  received  into 
the  seminal  intelligence  of  the  universe,  and  in  this  way  make  room 
for  the  fresh  souls  which  come  to  dwell  there.  .  .  Pass  then  through 
this  little  space  of  time  conformably  to  nature,  and  end  thy  jom-ney 
m  content,  just  as  an  olive  falls  off  when  it  is  ripe,  blessing  nature 
which  produced  it,  and  thanking  the  tree  on  which  it  grew." — [Marcus 
Aurelius:  "Meditations"  :  III.:  3;  IV.:  21:  48. 

XXXVI. :  p.  91. — A  striking  example  of  this  modern  uncertainty  of 
sceptics  concerning  immortality,  is  given  by  the  words  of  the  late  Prof. 
Clifford:— 

"And  this  same  judgment  [that  we  must  wait  before  deciding]  ap- 
plies necessarily  to  another  abstract  and  general  conclusion  from  an 
unproved  doctrine  about  body  and  mind ;  the  conclusion  that  a  man's 
consciousness  survives  the  decay  of  his  body.  Such  a  conclusion  can 
be  at  best,  in  the  present  state  of  knowledge,  a  hope,  a  conjecture,  an 
aspiration ;  it  can  have  no  claim  to  be  regarded  as  a  known  fact.  .  . 
Of  such  a  doctrine,  surely,  if  of  any  doctrine,  we  ought  to  say :  *  Do 
not  take  this  for  established  truth ;  be  prepared  to  find  that  it  is  other- 
wise ;  only  for  the  moment  we  are  of  opinion  that  it  may  possibly  be 
so.'"— [W.  K.  Clifford  :  "Lectures  and  Essays";  London  ed.,  1879: 
Vol.  2:  pp.  319-320. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  427 

XXXVIT.  :  p.  92. — '*  In  it  were  to  be  set  up  two  statues  of  himself, 
of  a  certain  prescribed  height,  the  one  in  bronze,  the  other  in  marble. 
.  .  Couches  and  benches  were  also  to  be  provided  for  those  days  on 
which  the  chamber  was  to  be  opened,  and  even  garments  for  the  guests. 
Orchards  and  other  property  are  assigned  for  the  proper  maintenance 
and  repair  of  the  sepulchre.  .  .  Of  the  nature  of  the  meal  [eaten  at 
the  tomb]  we  do  not  know  much.  It  is  called  by  two  veiy  different 
names — the  one  silicernium,  supposed  to  have  reference  to  the  silence 
of  the  Manes,  in  whose  presence  and  honour  it  was  held ;  the  other 
alogia,  interpreted  by  St.  Augustine  of  the  irrational  intemperance 
and  excess  with  which  it  was  sometimes  accompanied.  Certainly 
silence  was  not  imposed  upon  those  who  partook  of  the  feast;  they 
were  often  expressly  exhorted  to  be  merry  and  glad,  to  eat  and  drink 
and  refresh  themselves  without  anger,  strife,  or  melancholy — sine  hile^ 
sine  quereld.  .  .  This  was  one  of  the  reasons  why  the  Roman  sepul- 
chres took  up  so  much  room,  always  largely  in  excess  of  modern  re- 
quirements."— ["  Roma  Sotterranea  " :  (Northcote  and  Brownlow),  Lon- 
don ed.,  1879:  Part  1:  pp.  58-63. 

The  custom  above  described  naturally  connects  itself  with  the  Etrus- 
can fashions : — 

' '  These  [Etruscan]  cities  of  the  dead  are  constructed  on  the  precise 
model  of  the  cities  of  the  living.  The  tombs  themselves  are  exact  imi- 
tations of  the  house.  There  is  usually  an  outer  vestibule,  apparently 
appropriated  to  the  annual  funeral  feast ;  from  this  a  passage  leads  to 
a  large  central  chamber,  which  is  lighted  by  windows  cut  through  the 
rock.  This  central  hall  is  surrounded  by  smaller  chambers,  in  which 
the  dead  repose.  These  chambers  contain  the  corpses,  and  are  fur- 
nished with  all  the  implements,  ornaments,  and  utensils  used  in  life. 
The  tombs  are  in  fact  places  for  the  dead  to  live  in.  The  position  and 
surroundings  of  the  deceased  are  made  to  approximate  as  closely  as 
possible  to  the  conditions  of  life.  .  .  Nothiag  is  omitted  which  can 
conduce  to  the  amusement  or  comfort  of  the  deceased.  Their  spirits 
were  evidently  believed  to  inhabit  these  house-tombs  after  death,  just 
as  in  life  they  inhabited  their  houses.  .  .  The  Turanian  creed  was 
Animistic.  This  creed  taught  that  in  the  ghost- world  the  spirits  of  the 
departed  are  served  by  the  spirits  of  those  utensils  and  ornaments  which 
they  have  used  in  life.  It  thus  became  the  pious  duty  of  the  survivors 
to  place  in  the  tombs,  and  to  dedicate  to  the  perpetual  service  of  the 
deceased,  the  most  precious  treasures  which  they  possessed.  These 
constitute  the  costly  objects  which  the  Etruscan  tombs  have  yielded  in 
such  profusion,  and  which  now  crowd  the  shelves  of  our  museums." — 
[Taylor:  "Etruscan  Researches";  London,  1874:  pp.  46-8,  270. 

XXXVni. :  p.  92.— "The  transformation  of  the  Egyptian  religion 


$28  APPENDIX. 

is  nowhere  more  apparent  than  m  the  view  of  the  life  heyond  the  grave 
which  is  exhibited  on  a  tablet  which  has  already  been  referred  to,  that 
of  the  wife  of  Pasherenptah.  The  lady  thus  addi'essed  her  husband 
from  the  grave :  '  Oh  my  brother,  my  spouse,  cease  not  to  drink  and 
to  eat,  to  drain  the  cup  of  joy,  to  enjoy  the  love  of  woman,  and  to 
make  holiday ;  follow  thy  desires  each  day,  and  let  not  care  enter  thy 
heart,  as  long  as  thou  livest  upon  earth.  For  as  to  Amenti,  it  is  the 
land  of  heavy  slumber  and  of  darkness,  an  abode  of  sorrow  for  those 
who  dwell  there.  They  sleep  in  their  forms;  they  wake  not  any  more 
to  see  their  brethren ;  they  recognize  not  their  father  and  their  mother ; 
their  heart  is  indifferent  to  their  wife  and  children.  Every  one  [on 
-earth]  enjoys  the  water  of  hfe,  but  thirst  is  by  me.  .  .  As  to  the  god 
who  is  here,  '  Death- Absolute '  is  his  name.  He  calleth  on  all,  and  all 
men  come  to  obey  him,  trembling  with  fear  before  him.  .  .  One  f ear- 
eth  to  pray  to  him,  for  he  listeneth  not.  No  one  comes  to  invoke  him, 
for  he  is  not  kind  to  those  who  adore  him :  he  has  no  respect  to  any 
offering  which  is  made  to  him.'" — [Renouf :  "Eeligion  of  Ancient 
Egypt";  New  York  ed.,  1880  :  pp.  251-3. 

XXXIX.  :  p.  92. — The  discussion  by  Bumouf  of  the  proper  import  of 
the  word  Nirva?ia,  especially  as  originally  used  among  the  early  and 
the  Southern  Buddhists,  is  too  extended  and  elaborate  to  be  reproduced 
or  even  sketched  in  a  note.  Those  wishing  to  examine  it  will  find  it 
in  his  "Introduction  a  I'histoire du  Buddhisme  Indien "  (deuxieme  ed., 
Paris,  1876),  pp.  16-18,  459-465;  and  especially  in  the  Appendice,  pp. 
525-530.  His  positive  conclusion  is,  many  times  repeated  in  this 
learned  and  authoritative  work,  that  extinction,  annihilation,  pass- 
ing mto  nothingness,  represent  the  significance  of  Nirvana. 

"  He  [Grotama]  had  discarded  the  theoiy  of  the  presence,  within  each 
human  body,  of  a  soul  which  could  have  a  separate  and  eternal  exist- 
ence. .  .  In  no  case  is  there,  therefore,  any  future  life  in  the  Chris- 
tian sense.  At  a  man's  death,  nothiug  survives  but  the  effect  of  his 
actions.  .  .  Buddhism  sees  no  distinction  of  any  fundamental  charac- 
ter, no  difference  except  an  accidental  or  phenomenal  difference,  be- 
tween gods,  men,  plants,  animals,  and  thiugs.  All  are  the  product  of 
causes  that  have  been  acting  during  the  inuneasurable  ages  of  the  past ; 
and  all  will  be  dissolved." — [Rhys  Davids:  Lectures  on  "  Indian  Bud- 
dhism"; New  York  ed.,  1882:  pp.  93,  109,  214. 

"Buddhism  knew  not  the  Divine,  the  Eternal,  the  Absolute;  and 
the  Soul,  even  as  the  I,  or  as  the  mere  Self,  was  represented  in  the 
orthodox  metaphysics  of  Buddhism  as  transient,  as  futile,  as  a  mere 
phantom.  No  person  who  reads  with  attention  the  metaphysical  specu- 
lations on  the  Nirvana  contained  in  the  Buddhist  canon,  can  arrive  at 
imy  other  conviction  than  that  the  Nirvana,  the  highest  aim,  the  sum- 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  420 

mum  bonum  of  Buddhism,  is  the  absolute  Nothing." — [Max  Lluller: 
"  Science  of  Religion  ";  New  York  ed.,  1872:  p.  140. 

XL. :  p.  92. — "The  reader  will  be  prepared  by  the  preceding accocait 
not  to  expect  to  find  any  light  thrown  by  Confucius  on  the  great  prob- 
lems of  the  human  condition  and  destiny.  He  did  not  speculate  on  the 
creation  of  things,  or  the  end  of  them.  He  was  not  troubled  to  account 
for  the  origin  of  man,  nor  did  he  seek  to  know  about  his  hereafter. 
He  meddled  neither  with  physics  nor  metaphysics.  The  testimony  of 
the  Analects  about  the  subjects  of  his  teaching  is  the  following : 
*  His  frequent  themes  of  discourse  were  the  Book  of  Poetry,  the  Book 
of  History,  and  the  maintenance  of  the  rules  of  Propriety.'  '  He  taught 
letters,  ethics,  devotion  of  soul,  and  truthfulness.'  'Extraordinary 
things,  feats  of  strength,  states  of  disorder,  and  spiritual  beings,  he  did 
not  like  to  talk  about.'  .  .  His  end  was  not  unimpressive,  but  it  was 
melancholy.  He  sank  behind  a  cloud.  Disappointed  hopes  made  his 
soul  bitter.  .  ' .  Nor  were  the  expectations  of  another  life  present  with 
him  as  he  passed  through  the  dark  valley.  He  uttered  no  prayer  and 
he  betrayed  no  apprehensions." — [Legge:  "Chinese  Classics":  Proleg. 
Ch.  v.:  Sec.  H:  §6;  I.:  §9. 

XLI. :  p.  93. — "According  to  the  ancient  creed  of  Paganism,  ex- 
pressed in  the  well-known  lines  at  the  commencement  of  the  Iliad,  the 
^ouls  of  departed  heroes  did  indeed  survive  death ;  but  these  souls  were 
aot  themselves ;  they  were  the  mere  shadows  or  ghosts  of  what  had 
oeen ;  '  themselves '  were  the  bodies,  left  to  be  devoured  by  dogs  and 
vultures.  The  Apostle's  teaching,  on  the  other  hand,  is  always  that, 
amidst  whatever  change,  it  is  the  very  man  himseK  that  is  preserved ; 
and,  if  for  the  preservation  of  this  identity  any  outward  organization 
IS  required,  then,  although  '  flesh  and  blood  cannot  inherit  the  king- 
dom of  heaven,'  God  from  the  infinite  treasure-house  of  the  new  heav- 
ens and  new  earth  will  furnish  that  organization,  as  He  has  already 
furnished  it  to  the  several  stages  of  creation  in  the  present  order  of  the 
world." — [Dean  Stanley:  "Com.  on  Ep.  to  Corinthians";  London  ed., 
1876:  pp.  326-7. 

' '  I  find  Him  such  after  the  suffering  of  death  as  He  was  before  it — 
save  His  recent  scars.  The  immortality,  therefore,  which  is  held  be- 
fore me  in  the  Christian  scheme,  is  no  such  thing  as  a  nucleus  of  con- 
scious mist,  floating  about  in  a  golden  fog,  amid  millions  of  the  same 
purposeless,  limbless  sparks.  It  is  an  immortality  of  organized  ma- 
terial energies ; — it  is  the  same  welded  mind-and-matter  human  nature, 
fitted  for  service,  apt  to  labour,  and  capable  of  all  those  experiences, 
and  furnished  for  all  those  enterprises,  and  armed  for  those  endurances, 
which,  seeing  that  they  are  thus  provided  for,  and  ai*e  one  may  say 


430  APPENDIX. 

thus  foreshown  in  the  Chiistian  resurrection,  put  before  me  a  rational 
solution  of  these  now  imminent  trials,  of  these  hard  experiences,  oi 
these  frustrated  labours,  and  of  these  fiery  sufferings,  the  passing 
through  which  so  much  perplexes  and  disheartens  me  now ;  which  at 
once  find  their  reason  when  I  see  them  in  their  intention  as  the  needed 
schooling  for  an  immortality,  in  the  endless  fortunes  of  which  this 
mind-and-matter  structure  shall  have  room  to  show  what  things  it  can 
do  and  bear,  and  what  enterprises  of  love  it  shall  devise,  and  shall 
bring  to  a  happy  consummation,  it  may  be  cycles  of  centuries  hence." — 
[Isaac  Taylor:  "  Restoration  of  Belief '^  Boston  ed. ,  1867 :  pp.  329-330. 

XLII. :  p.  96. — "Even  where  the  severest  doctrine  of  exclusion  has 
prevailed,  the  fundamental  sentiment  of  Christian  faith  has  saved  the 
heart  from  the  most  withering  of  all  passions, — the  blight  of  scorn. 
Human  nature  may  appear  beneath  the  eye  of  an  austere  believer  in 
an  awful,  but  never  in  a  contemptible  light.  The  very  crisis  in  which 
it  is  suspended  can  belong  to  no  mean  existence.  What  it  has  lost  is 
too  great  a  glory,  what  it  has  incurred  is  too  deep  a  terror,  to  be 
conceivable  except  of  a  being  on  a  grand  scale.  He  is  no  worm  for 
whom  the  eternal  abysses  are  built  as  a  dungeon,  and  the  lightnings 
are  brandished  as  a  scourge.  Accordingly,  the  very  alienations  of  in- 
tolerance itself  have  acquired  a  higher  and  more  respectable  character 
than  in  ancient  faiths.  The  sort  of  feeling  with  which  the  Jew  spurned 
'  the  Grentile  dog '  is  sanctioned  by  piety  no  more.  The  Oriental  curl 
of  the  lip  is  scarcely  traceable  on  the  features  of  Christendom;  and  is 
replaced  by  an  expression  of  tragic  sorrow  and  earnestness,  where 
lights  of  admiring  pity  flash  through  the  darkest  clouds." — [Jamea 
Martmeau:  " Studies  of  Christianity  " ;  Boston  ed.,  1866:  pp.  317-318. 

XLHI. :  p.  96. — "  'What  is  your  name  ?  place  of  abode  ? '  Fouquier 
asks:  according  to  formality.  *My  name  is  Danton,'  answers  he;  'a 
name  tolerably  known  in  the  Revolution ;  my  abode  will  soon  be  An- 
nihilation {dans  le  Neant),  but  I  shall  live  in  the  Pantheon  of  History.' 
.  .  Camille  makes  answer  :  '  My  age  is  that  of  the  bon  Sansculotte 
Jesus:  an  age  fatal  to  Revolutionists.' " — [Carlyle:  " French  Revolu- 
tion"; Boston  ed.,  1839;  Vol.  3:  p.  319. 

The  same  title  had  been  before  applied  in  the  same  way,  by  the  Jaco- 
bin Societies,  eulogizing  Marat  ! — [Vol.  2 :  pp.  211-12. 

XLIV. :  p.  97. — "He  who  does  not  know  Him  [Christ],  knows  noth- 
ing of  the  order  of  the  world,  and  nothing  of  himself.  For  not  only 
do  we  know  God  by  Jesus  Christ,  but  we  only  know  ourselves  by  Jesus 
Christ.  .  .  In  him  is  all  our  goodness,  our  virtue,  our  life,  our  light,  our 
hope;  without  him,  there  is  for  us  only  misery,  darkness,  and  despair,. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  43J 

and  we  shall  see  only  obscurity  and  confusion  in  the  nature  of  God, 
And  in  our  own  nature." — [Pascal :  "  Pensees  " :  Sec.  Par.,  Art.  XV. :  2. 

XLV. :  p.  98. — "The  man  who  became  so  famous  under  the  name 
•of  Gregory  VII.  was,  like  the  greater  number  of  those  who  attained 
eminence  in  the  church,  of  obscure  origin.  The  date  of  his  birth,  even, 
is  not  exactly  known ;  but  we  may  place  it  between  the  years  1015  and 
1020.  He  first  saw  the  light  at  Soano,  a  small  town  of  Tuscany,  where 
his  father,  who  was  named  Bonic  or  Bonizon,  followed  the  trade  of  a 
carpenter.  The  son  of  the  carpenter  at  Soano  received  at  his  baptism 
the  German  name  of  Hildebrand,  modified  by  the  Italian  pronuncia- 
tion to  Hellebrand,  which  has  been  translated  by  his  contemporaries 
*  pure  fiame,'  or  '  brand  of  hell,'  according  to  the  affection  or  the  detes- 
tation by  which  the  writer  was  actuated." — [Villemain  :  "Life  of 
Gregory  the  Seventh";  London  ed.,  1874  :  Vol.  1 :  p.  231. 

XLVI.  :    p.  99.— 

"  Oh,  would  that  nature  had  denied  me  birth 
'Midst  this  fifth  race,  the  iron  age  of  earth  ; 
That  long  before  within  the  grave  I  lay, 
Or  long  hereafter  could  behold  the  day  ! 
Corrupt  the  race,  with  toils  and  griefs  opprest, 
Nor  day  nor  right  can  yield  a  pause  of  rest ; 
Still  do  the  gods  a  weight  of  care  bestow, 
Though  still  some  good  is  mingled  with  the  woe  1 " 

[Hesiod  :  ' '  Works  and  Days  " :  [Elton's  trans.] :  227-234. 

"Happiest  beyond  compare 
Never  to  taste  of  life  ; 
Happiest  in  order  next. 
Being  born,  with  quickest  speed 
Thither  again  to  turn 
From  whence  we  came." 

[Sophocles  :  CEdipus,  at  Colonos  :  [Plumptre's 
trans.,  1873]  1225-1229. 

"For  it  is  becoming  for  us  formally  to  assemble  and  lament 
for  one  who  is  born,  who  is  advancing  to  meet  so  many  evils ;  but  to 
offer  glad  gratulations  to  the  dead,  to  whom  at  last  rest  has  been 
given." — [Euripides:  Quoted  by  Clement  of  Alex.:  Strom.  III.:  3. 
Quoted  also  by  Cicero  :  Tuscul.  Quaest. :  I. :  48. 

"Do not  then  consider  life  a  thing  of  any  value.  For  look  to  the 
immensity  of  time  behind  thee,  and  to  the  time  before  thee,  another 
boundless  space.  In  this  infinity,  then,  what  is  the  difference  between 
him  who  lives  three  days,  and  him  who  lives  for  three  generations  I  "— 
[Marcus  Aurelius  :  "Meditations":  IV.:  50. 


432  APPENDIZ. 

"It  would  be  a  man's  happiest  lot  to  depart  from  manlrind  without 
having-  had  any  taste  of  lying  and  hypocrisy  and  luxury  and  pride. 
However,  to  breathe  out  one's  life  when  a  man  has  had  enough  of  these 
things,  is  the  next  best  voyage,  as  the  saying  is." — [IX. :  2. 

XL VII. :  p.  99. — "  Physiology  distinctly  and  categorically  pronounces 
against  any  individual  immortality,  and  against  all  ideas  which  are 
connected  with  the  figment  of  a  separate  existence  of  the  soul.  .  .  V 
is  impossible  to  demonstrate  the  admissibility  of  punishment,  or  to 
prove  that  there  is  any  such  thing  as  amenability  or  responsibility  " 
[Vogt].  "Man  is  produced  from  wind  and  ashes.  .  Man  is  the  sum 
of  his  parents  and  liis  Avet-nurse,  of  time  and  place,  of  wind  and  mat- 
ter, of  sound  and  light,  of  food  and  clothing ;  his  will  is  the  necessary 
consequence  of  all  these  causes,  governed  by  the  laws  of  nature,  just 
as  the  planet  in  its  orbit,  as  the  vegetalDle  in  its  soil.  Thought  consists 
in  the  motion  of  matter,  it  is  a  translocation  of  the  cerebral  substance ; 
without  phosphorus  there  can  be  no  thought ;  and  consciousness  itself 
is  nothing  but  an  attribute  of  matter"  [Moleschott].  The  watchword 
of  this  school  is,  in  short:  "  We  ai*e  what  we  eat "  [Feuerbach] ;  or,  as 
Czolbe  expresses  it,  man  is  *'  nothing  more  than  a  mosaic  figure,  made 
up  of  different  atoms,  and  mechanically  combined  in  an  elaborate 
shape." — [See  Christlieb  :  "Modern  Doubt  and  Christian  Belief": 
New  York  ed. :  pp.  146,  158. 

"  If  we  look  into  ourselves,  we  discover  propensities  which  declare  that 
our  mtellects  have  arisen  from  a  lower  form ;  could  our  minds  be  made 
visible,  we  should  find  them  tailed.  .  .  All  that  is  elevated,  all  that 
is  lovely,  in  human  nature  has  its  origin  in  the  lower  kingdom.  The 
philosophic  spirit  of  inquiry  may  be  traced  to  brute  curiosity,  and  that 
to  the  habit  of  examining  all  things  in  search  of  food.  Artistic  genius 
is  an  expansion  of  monkey  imitativeness.  Loyalty  and  piety,  the 
reverential  virtues,  are  developed  from  filial  love.  Benevolence  and 
magnanimity,  the  generous  virtues,  from  parental  love.  The  sense  of 
decorum  proceeds  from  the  sense  of  cleanliness ;  and  that  from  the  m- 
stinct  of  sexual  display.  .  .  How  easy  it  would  be  to  endure  without 
repining  the  toils  and  troubles  of  this  miserable  life,  if  indeed  we  could 
beheve  that,  when  its  brief  period  was  past,  we  should  be  united  to 
those  whom  we  have  loved,  to  those  whom  death  has  snatched  away, 
or  whom  fate  has  parted  from  us  by  barriers  cold  and  deep  and  hope- 
less as  the  grave.  But  we  do  not  believe  it;  and  so  we  cling  to  our  tor- 
tured lives,  dreading  the  dark  Nothingness,  dreading  the  dispersal  ol 
our  elements  into  cold  unconscious  space.  As  drops  in  the  ocean  of 
water,  as  atoms  in  the  ocean  of  air,  as  sparks  in  the  ocean  of  fire  with 
in  the  earth,  our  minds  do  their  appointed  work  and  serve  to  build  up 
the  strength  and  bea,uty  of  the  one  great  Human  Mind  which  grows 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  III.  433 

from  century  to  century,  from  age  to  age,  and  is  perhaps  itself  a  mere 
molecule  within  some  higher  mind." — [Winwood  Reade  :  "Martyrdom 
of  Man";  New  York  ed. :  pp.  394-5,  243-4. 

XL VIII.  :  p.  99.— "  The  word  of  Schleiermacher :  'in  the  midst  of 
fm-iteness  to  become  one  Avith  the  Infinite,  and  to  be  eternal  in  every 
moment ' :  this  is  all  which  modern  science  knows  how  to  say  concera- 
ing  Immortality. 

"  Herewith  is  our  task  for  the  present  ended.  While  eternity  is  the 
unity  in  all  things,  in  its  aspect  as  a  future  life  it  is  the  last  enemy 
which  speculative  criticism  has  to  fight,  and  if  possible  to  overcome." 
—[Strauss  :  "  Christliche  Glaubenslehi-e  " :  Band  n. :  S.  739. 

XLIX.  :  p.  99. — "  Children,  and  the  lower  classes  of  most  countries, 
seem  to  be  actually  fond  of  dirt ;  the  vast  majority  of  the  human  race 
are  mdiff erent  to  it ;  whole  nations  of  otherwise  civilized  and  cultivated 
human  beings  tolerate  it  in  some  of  its  worst  forms,  and  only  a  very 
small  mmority  are  consistently  offended  by  it.  .  .  In  the  limes  when 
mankind  were  nearer  to  their  natural  state,  cultivated  ol)servers  re- 
gai'ded  the  natural  man  as  a  sort  of  wild  animal,  distinguished  chiefly 
by  being  craftier  than  the  other  beasts  of  the  field ;  and  all  worth  of 
character  was  deemed  the  result  of  a  sort  of  taming,  a  phrase  often 
apj)lied  by  the  ancient  philosophers  to  the  appropriate  discipline  of  hu- 
man beings.  .  .  The  most  criminal  actions  are  to  a  being  like  man 
not  more  unnatural  than  most  of  the  virtues.  .  .  The  mere  cessation 
oi  existence  is  no  evil  to  any  one ;  the  idea  is  only  formidable  through 
the  illusion  of  imagination  " :  though  the  loss  of  friends,  dymg  before 
us  "  will  always  suffice  to  keep  alive  in  the  more  sensitive  natures  the 
imaginative  hope  of  a  futurity,  which,  if  there  is  nothing  to  prove, 
there  is  as  little  in  our  knowledge  and  experience  to  contradict.  .  .  It 
seems  to  me  not  only  possible  but  probable,  that  in  a  higher,  and  above 
all  a  happier  condition  of  human  life,  not  annihilation  but  immortality 
maybe  the  burdensome  idea." — [John  Stuart  MUl  :  "Essays  on  Re- 
ligion"; New  York  ed.,  1874:  pp.  48,  46,  62,  122. 

It  was  of  Mill  that  Holyoake  wrote:  "No  more  generous,  self-re- 
liant, self -regardless  thinker  than  he  ever  entered  the  adventurous  pass 
of  Death  !"— [Essay  on  Mill:  London,  1873:  p.  29. 

28 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV. 

Note  I. :  page  104. — "I  myself,  when  a  young  man,  used  sometime* 
to  go  to  the  sacrilegious  entertainments  and  spectacles ;  I  saw  tlie  priests 
raving  in  religious  excitement,  and  heard  the  choristers ;  I  took  pleas- 
ure in  the  shameful  games  which  were  celebrated  in  honor  of  gods  and 
goddesses,  of  the  virgin  Coelestis,  and  Berecynthia,  the  mother  of  all 
the  gods.  And  on  the  day  consecrated  to  her  purification,  there  were 
sung  before  her  couch  productions  so  obscene  and  filthy  to  the  ear — I 
do  not  say  of  the  mother  of  the  gods,  but  of  the  mother  of  any  senator 
or  honest  man — ^nay,  so  impure  that  not  even  the  mother  of  the  foul- 
mouthed  players  themselves  could  have  formed  one  of  the  audience.  "^ 
— [Augustine,  Civ.  Dei :    II. :  4. 

II. :  p.  104. — "  They  [the  Christians]  affirmed  this  to  have  been  the 
whole  of  their  guilt,  or  their  error,  that  they  were  accustomed  to  meet, 
on  a  stated  day,  before  it  was  light,  and  to  sing  a  hymn  responsively 
among  themselves  to  Christ,  as  to  God ;  binding  themselves  also,  by  a 
solemn  oath,  not  to  do  any  wickedness,  but  that  they  would  not  com- 
mit Any  fraud,  theft,  or  adultery,  would  not  falsify  their  word,  nor 
deny  a  trust  when  they  should  be  called  to  account  for  it ;  after  which 
it  was  their  custom  to  separate,  and  then  to  reassemble,  to  eat  in  com- 
mon a  harmless  meal.  .  .  After  this  I  judged  it  the  more  necessary  to 
seek  what  the  truth  might  be,  by  putting  to  the  torture  two  female 
servants  who  were  said  to  officiate  among  them  [probably  as  deacon- 
esses]. But  I  found  nothing  else  than  a  perverse  and  extravagant 
superstition."— [Pliny  '  Ep. :  X.  xcvn. 

m. :  p.  104. — "  'Let  us  pass  on,'  says  he  [Celsus],  'to  another  point. 
They  [Christians]  cannot  tolerate  temples,  altars,  or  images.  In  this 
they  are  like  the  Scythians,  the  nomadic  tribes  of  Libya,  the  Seres  who 
worship  no  god,  and  some  other  of  the  most  barbarous  and  impious 
nations  of  the  world.  .  .  Celsus  proceeds  to  say  that  we  '  shrink  from 
raising  altars,  statues,  and  temples;  and  this,'  he  thinks,  'has  been 
agreed  upon  among  us  as  the  badge  or  distinctive  mark  of  a  secret  and 
forbidden  society.'" — rOrigen,  adv.  Celsus  :  vn. :  62;  vm. :  17. 

"Hence  we  are  called  Atheists.  And  we  confess  that  we  are  A. the- 
r434) 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  435 

ists,  so  far  as  gods  of  this  sort  are  concerned,  but  not  with  respect  to 
the  most  true  God,  the  Father  of  righteousness  and  tempeiance,  and 
the  other  virtues,  who  is  free  from  all  impurity.  But  both  Him  and 
the  Son  who  came  forth  from  Him,  .  .  and  the  prophetic  Spirit,  we 
worship  and  adore,  knowing  them  in  reason  and  in  truth." — [Justin 
Martyr  :  Apol.  I. :  vi. 

IV. :  p.  104. — The  figure  referred  to  is  well  enough  represented  in 
Lundy's  "Monumental  Christianity"  [New  York  ed.,  1876],  p.  61. 
The  stucco  which  contains  it  is  preserved  in  the  museum  of  the  Vati- 
can, as  a  precious  relic  of  early  Christianity  at  Eome ;  and  the  word* 
of  Tertullian  would  seem  to  indicate  that  such  a  figure  was  understood 
by  some  in  his  time  to  represent  the  Lord  of  the  Christians : — 

"Like  some  others,  you  are  under  the  delusion  that  our  god  is  an 
ass's  head.  Cornelius  Tacitus  first  put  this  notion  into  people's  minds. 
.  .  But  the  said  Tacitus  (the  very  opposite  of  tacit  in  telling  lies)  in- 
forms us  that  when  C.  Pompeius  captured  Jerusalem,  he  entered  the 
temple  to  see  the  arcana  of  the  Jewish  religion,  but  found  no  image 
there.  Yet  surely  if  worship  were  rendered  to  any  visible  object,  the 
very  place  for  its  exhibition  would  be  the  shrine.  .  .  Perhaps  it  is  this 
which  displeases  you  in  us,  that  while  your  worship  [of  beasts]  is  uni- 
versal, we  worship  only  the  ass! " — [Apolog.  xvi. 

So  Caecilius  says,  in  the  "  Octavius  "  of  Minucius  Felix: — 

"I  hear  that  they  [Christians]  adore  the  head  of  an  ass,  that  basest 
of  creatures,  consecrated  by  I  know  not  what  silly  persuasion, — a 
worthy  and  appropriate  religion  for  such  manners." — [ix. 

The  reference  of  the  Palatine  graphite  to  Christ  is  not,  however,  uni- 
versally conceded  by  the  students  of  Christian  antiqidties. 

V. :  p.  105. — "And  on  the  day  called  Sunday,  all  who  live  in  cities 
or  in  the  country  gather  together  to  one  place,  and  the  memoirs  of  the 
apostles,  or  the  writings  of  the  prophets  are  read,  as  long  as  time  per- 
mits ;  then,  when  the  reader  has  ceased,  the  president  verbally  instructs, 
and  exhorts  to  the  imitation  of  these  good  things.  Then  we  all  rise  to- 
gether and  pray,  and,  as  we  before  said,  when  our  prayer  is  ended,, 
bread  and  wine  and  water  are  brought,  and  the  president  in  like  man- 
ner offers  prayers  and  thanksgivings,  according  to  his  ability,  and  the 
people  assent,  saying  Amen  ;  and  there  is  a  distribution  to  each,  and  a 
participation  of  that  over  which  thanks  have  been  given,  and  to  those 
who  are  absent  a  portion  is  sent  by  the  deacons.  And  they  who  are 
well  to  do,  and  willing,  give  what  each  thinks  fit;  and  what  is  col- 
lected is  deposited  with  the  president,  who  succors  the  orphans  and- 
widows,  and  those  who,  through  sickness  or  any  other  cause,  are  in 
want,  and  those  who  are  in  bonds,   and  the  strangers  sojourning^ 


436  APPENDIX. 

among  us,  and  in  a  word  takes  care  of  all  who  are  in  need.  But  Sun- 
day is  tlie  day  on  which  we  all  hold  our  common  assembly,  because  it  ia 
the  first  day,  on  which  Grod,  having  wrought  a  change  in  the  darkness 
and  matter,  made  the  world ;  and  Jesus  Christ  our  Saviour  on  the  same 
day  rose  from  the  dead." — [Justin  Martyr  :  Apol.  I. :  Lxvn. 

VI. :  p.  107. — "  To  maintain  that  the  sacrifice  of  atonement  was  the 
only  original  offering  of  the  Greeks,  and  to  derive  all  other  forms  from 
it,  would  be  inadmissible.  To  acknowledge  in  practice  the  supremacy 
and  power  of  the  divinity,  to  present  it  with  a  pledge,  as  it  were,  of 
homage  and  subjection  to  its  will,  to  return  thanks  for  gifts  received, 
or  protection  afforded, — this  was  the  primitive  signification  of  many 
sacrifices.  .  .  Even  the  Greek  idea  of  the  envy  of  the  gods,  and  the 
necessity  of  appeasing  this  jealousy  by  a  voluntary  cession  of  a  portion 
of  their  goods,  was  the  foundation  of  many  sacrifices.  .  .  It  was  tlie 
prevalent  idea,  that  for  a  man  to  obtain  any  thing  of  the  gods,  he 
must  of  necessity  make  them  an  offering  to  correspond.  'Presents 
win  the  gods,  as  well  as  kings,'  was  an  old  proverb," — [Dollinger : 
*'The  Gentile  and  the  Jew";  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  1:  pp.  229,  233-4. 

VII. :  p.  108. — "  In  the  provinces  1,500  temples  are  dedicated  to  his 
[Confucius']  worship,  where  on  the  first  and  fifteenth  day  of  each 
month  sacrificial  services  are  performed  before  his  image,  and  once  in 
the  spring  and  the  autumn  the  local  officials  go  in  state  to  take  part  in 
acts  of  specially  solemn  worship.  According  to  the  Shing  meaou  che, 
or  '  History  of  the  Temples  of  the  Sage,'  as  many  as  6  bullocks,  27,000 
pigs,  5,800  sheep,  2,800  doer,  and  2,700  hares,  are  sacrificed  on  these 
occasions  ;  and  at  the  same  time  27,000  pieces  of  silk  are  offered  on  his 
shrine. " — [Douglas :  ' '  Confucianism  and  Taouism  " ;  London  ed. ,  1879 : 
p.  165. 

The  religion  of  Zoroaster  is  often  praised  for  the  care  which  it  en- 
joined in  the  treatment  of  certain  animals,  especially  the  cow,  the  cock, 
and  the  dog.  One  occasion  of  this  was  the  importance  of  such  animals 
to  a  pastoral  people :  as  Auramazda  says  in  the  Vendidad  of  the  Avesta, 
*  No  thief  or  wolf  comes  to  the  village  or  the  fold  and  carries  away 
anything  unobserved,  if  the  dog  is  healthy,  in  good  voice,  and  among 
the  flocks.  The  houses  would  not  stand  firm  upon  the  earth  if  there 
were  not  dogs  in  the  villages  and  flocks,'  Therefore  the  dogs  must 
receive  good  food  ;  especially  the  watch-dog  must  be  provided  with 
milk,  fat,  and  flesh,  his  'proper  food,'  Dogs  with  young  are  to  be 
treated  as  carefully  as  pregnant  women  :  sick  dogs,  with  the  same 
medicines  as  sick  men.  All  men  who  beat  dogs  are  warned  that  their 
souls  will  go  from  the  world  full  of  terror  and  sick.  To  kill  a  water- 
dog  is  thf  greatest  of  crimes.     Yet  Athenseus  tells  us  that  with  the 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  437 

King  of  Persia  a  thousand  animals  were  daily  slaughtered  in  sacrifice . 
camels,  hares,  oxen,  apes,  deer,  and  especially  sheep  :  and  Herodotus 
says  that  when  Xerxes  marched  into  Hellas  the  Magians  sacrificed  a 
thousand  oxen  on  the  summit  of  Pergamos,  soliciting  victory. — [See 
Duncker:  "History  of  Antiquity";  London  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  5:  pp. 
208-9,  174. 

"  The  Rig-Veda  was  mainly  a  collection  of  sacrificial  chants  and  rit- 
ual. Brahmans,  no  less  than  Kshatriyas  and  Vaigyas,  were  accus- 
tomed to  invoke  the  spirits  of  light  in  the  early  dawn,  to  offer  gifts  at 
morning,  mid-day,  and  evening,  to  Agni :  above  all  to  celebrate  sacri- 
fices at  the  changes  of  the  moon  or  the  seasons.  .  .  The  idea  that 
every  sacrifice  when  offered  correctly  was  efficacious,  that  a  magic 
power  resided  in  it,  that  the  assistance  and  therefore  a  part  of  the  di- 
vine power  or  nature  was  gained  by  the  sacrifice,  could  not  fail  to  re- 
tain the  sei'vice  of  sacrifice  in  full  force  in  the  new  doctrine.  .  .  We 
see  from  the  rules  of  the  Brahmanas  that  offerings,  consecrations,  and 
sacrifices  were  not  diminished  but  rather  increased  by  the  idea  of 
Brahman,  and  the  number  of  the  sacrificing  priests  was  greater.  .  . 
An  incorrect  word,  a  false  intonation,  may  destroy  the  efficacy  of  the 
entire  sacrifice.  For  this  reason  the  rules  for  the  great  sacrifice,  es- 
pecially for  the  sacrifice  of  horses,  fill  up  whole  books  of  the  Brah- 
manas."— [Duncker:  *'History  of  Antiquity";  London  ed. ,  1880 :  Vol. 
IV. :  pp.  162,  273-4. 

*'  In  fine,  a  great  many  of  these  sacrifices  [the  Vedic]  require  animal 
victims.  In  the  domestic  ritual  the  act  of  sacrificing  them  is  resolved 
for  the  most  part  into  a  purely  symbolic  act,  but  in  the  developed 
ritual  it  remained  longer  in  force.  Several  ishtis  are  very  bloody.  .  . 
In  general,  the  more  recent  the  texts  are  the  more  does  the  number  of 
the  symbolic  victims  increase,  and  that  of  the  real  ones  diminish ;  but 
even  with  these  abatements  the  Brahmanical  cultus  remained  for  long 
an  inhuman  one." — [A.  Barth :  "Religions  of  India";  Boston  ed., 
1882:  p.  57. 

* '  Dr.  Haug  maintains  that  some  hymns  of  a  decidedly  sacrificial 
character  should  be  ascribed  to  the  earliest  period  of  Vedic  poetry. 
He  takes,  for  instance,  the  hymn  describing  the  horse  sacrifice,  and 
he  concludes  from  the  fact  that  seven  priests  only  are  mentioned  in  it 
by  name,  and  that  none  of  them  belongs  to  the  class  of  the  Udgatars 
(singers)  or  Brahmans  (superintendents),  that  this  hymn  was  written 
before  the  establishment  of  these  two  classes  of  priests.  As  these 
priests  are  mentioned  in  other  Vedic  hymns,  he  concludes  that  the 
hymn  describing  the  horse  sacrifice  is  of  a  very  early  date.  Dr.  Haug 
strengthens  his  case  by  a  reference  to  the  Zoroastrian  ceremonial."— 
[Max  Miiller:  "  Chips,"  etc. ;  New  York  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  1:  p.  105. 


438  appendix:. 

VIII. :  p.  108. — "  But  what  man  sought,  Divine  salvation  and  Di  viiit 
counsel,  this  is  even  now,  and  was  then  more  than  now,  the  most  dif- 
ficult and  mysterious  thing  that  man  can  seek,  hesides  heing  to  him  a 
something  inexhaustible,  in  relation  to  which  he  stands  ever  freshly 
conscious  of  a  new  need.  In  his  attitude  toward  this  he  therefore  felt 
readily  inclined  to  any  endeavor  and  to  the  hardest  service,  indeed 
ready  for  the  most  grievous  and  strange  eflPorts:  the  something  Awful 
standing  over  against  men  constrained  them  to  give  up  all  things  for 
H,  or  to  hazard  all  things  in  order  to  draw  near  to  it,  and  to  attract  it 
to  themselves.  But  man  can  only  give  up  what  is  human  in  order 
thereby  to  gain  what  is  Divine  ;  and  already  a  darkling  impulse  led 
him  to  believe  that  he  would  the  more  readily  win  the  superlative  Di- 
vine gift  the  more  mightily  he,  through  the  greatest  sacrifice  of  all 
his  inferior  possessions,  sought  the  higher  things.  Now  all  work 
of  such  practical  giving  up,  whereby  the  man  presses  in  immediately 
to  the  Grodhead,  and  seeks  not  only  to  move  that,  but  more  thoroughly 
to  come  into  contact  with  it,  in  order  to  be  in  turn  touched  by  it  and 
made  blessed,  we  may  comprehensively  name  Saxjrifice,  to  apply  to  it  a 
universal  word.  .  .  But  the  conclusion  from  such  a  feeling  must 
finally  be  that  human  life  is  incomparably  the  highest  and  most  won- 
derful sacrifice  possible  to  be  offered — be  it  that  of  a  sacrificed 
stranger,  or  that  which  is  dearest,  of  one's  own  child,  or  even  of  one's 
self,  converted  into  an  offering.  So  human  sacrifice  was  placed  ap- 
propriately as  the  pinnacle  and  consummation  of  all  these  expressions 
of  the  awe  of  man  before  God. " — [E wald :  ' '  Die  Alterthiimer  des  Volkes 
Israel";  Gottingen,  1866:  S.  32,  36,  f. 

IX.  :  p.  108. — "Among  these  pindian]  victims,  which  consist  of  all 
imaginable  kinds  of  domestic  and  wild  animals,  there  is  one  which  re- 
curs with  an  ominous  frequency,  viz. ,  man.  Not  only  are  there  traces  of 
human  sacrifice  preserved  in  the  legends,  as  well  as  in  the  symbolism 
of  the  ritual,  but  this  sacrifice  is  expressly  mentioned  and  formally 
prescribed.  .  .  Neither  is  there  room  to  doubt  that  the  blood  of  hu- 
man victims  not  unfrequently  flowed  on  the  altars  of  these  gloomy 
goddesses,  before  the  horrible  images  of  Durga,  Kali,  Candika,  and 
Camunda.  Formal  testimonies  go  to  confirm  the  many  allusions  to 
this  practice  which  occur  in  the  tales  and  dramas.  In  the  sixteenth 
century  the  Mohammedans  found  it  established  in  northern  Bengal ; 
in  the  seventeenth,  the  Sikhs  confess  that  their  great  reformer,  Guru 
Govind,  prepared  himseK  for  his  mission  by  the  sacrifice  of  one  of  his 
disciples  to  Durga ;  in  1824  Bishop  Heber  met  with  people  who  told 
him  that  they  had  seen  young  boys  offered  in  sacrifice  at  the  gates  of 
Calcutta ;  and  almost  as  late  as  our  own  time,  the  Thugs  professed  to 
murder  their  victims  in  honour  of  Kali." — [A.  Barth:  "  The  Religions 
of  India";  Boston  ed  ,  1882:  pp.  57,  203-4. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  439 

"  To  this  black  Goddess  [Call,  wife  of  Siva]  with  a  collar  of  golden 
skulls,  as  we  see  her  exhibited  in  all  her  principal  temples,  human  sac 
rifices  were  anciently  offered,  as  the  Vedas  enjoined;  but  in  the  present 
age  they  are  absolutely  prohibited,  as  are  also  the  sacrifices  of  bulls 
and  horses :  kids  are  still  offered  to  her ;  and,  to  palliate  the  cruelty  of  the 
slaughter,  which  gave  such  offence  to  Buddha,  the  Brahmans  inculcate 
a  belief  that  the  poor  victims  rise  into  the  heaven  of  Indra,  where  they 
become  the  musicians  of  his  band." — [Sir  William  Jones:  Works; 
London,  1817:  Vol.  3:  p.  383. 

X.  :  p.  108. — "When  Themistocles  was  about  to  sacrifice,  close  to 
the  admiral's  galley,  there  were  three  prisoners  brought  to  him,  fine- 
looking  men,  and  richly  dressed  in  ornamented  clothing  and  gold,  said 
to  be  the  children  of  Artayctes  and  Sandace,  sister  to  Xerxes.  As  soon 
as  the  prophet  Euphrantides  saw  them,  and  observed  that  at  the  same 
time  the  fire  blazed  out  from  the  offerings  with  a  more  than  ordinary 
flame,  .  .  he  took  Themistocles  by  the  hand,  and  bade  him  consecrate 
the  three  young  men  for  sacrifice,  and  offer  them  up,  with  prayers  for 
victory,  to  Bacchus  the  Devourer.  .  .  Themistocles  was  much  dis- 
turbed at  this  strange  and  terrible  prophecy,  but  the  common  people, 
.  .  calhng  upon  Bacchus  with  one  voice,  led  the  captives  to  the  altar, 
and  compelled  the  execution  of  the  sacrifice,  as  the  prophet  had  com- 
manded."—[Plutarch:  "Lives";  Boston  ed.,  1859:  Vol.  1:  p.  247. 

"  For  it  once  happened,  that  while  the  inhabitants  of  this  place  [Pot- 
niae]  were  sacrificmg,  they  became  so  outrageous,  through  intoxica- 
tion, that  they  slew  the  priest  of  Bacchus.  As  a  punishment  for  thia 
action,  they  were  aflOicted  with  a  pestilent  disease ;  and  at  the  same 
time  were  ordered  by  the  Delphic  Oracle  to  sacrifice  to  Bacchus  a  boy 
in  the  flower  of  his  youth.  However,  not  many  years  after  this,  they 
say  that  the  god  changed  the  sacrifice  of  a  boy  for  that  of  a  goat."— 
[Pausanias :  ' '  Descript.  of  Greece  " :  IX. :  8. 

XI.  :  p.  108. — "  There  grew  up  even  in  Athens  the  horrible  custom 
of  nourishing  every  year,  at  cost  of  the  State,  two  poor  forsaken  per- 
sons, male  and  female,  and  then  at  the  festival  of  Thargelia  of  putting 
them  to  death  for  the  expiation  of  the  people,  as  though  they  had 
assumed  their  sins.  .  .  The  same  expiatory  custom  existed  in  the 
Phocaean  colony,  Massilia.  .  .  So  in  Cyprus,  in  the  cities  Amathus 
and  Salamis,  a  man  was  every  year  sacrificed  to  Zeus ;  in  the  latter 
city,  in  the  month  Aphrodisios,  one  to  Agraulus,  and  in  later  times  to 
Diomedes.  .  .  In  general  it  may  with  certainty  be  assumed  that  hu- 
man expiatory  sacrifices  prevailed  in  all  parts  of  Greece ;  among  no 
other  people  are  there  found  more  or  more  various  accounts  of  such 
vofferings  than  among  the  Hellenists.    .    .   As  often  as  any  great  and 


440  APPENDIX. 

general  calamity  threatened  the  existence  of  the  lioman  state,  by  order- 
of  the  books  of  fate  human  victims  were  sacrificed.  .  .  It  wau  'aot 
until  the  year  657  of  the  city,  or  97  years  before  Christ,  that  the  Sen- 
ate issued  a  decree  forbidding  human  sacrifices.  But  in  spite  of  this- 
we  read  that  the  dictator  J.  Caesar,  a.d.  708,  or  46  years  before  Christ, 
commanded  a  sacrifice  of  two  men,  with  the  traditionary  solemnities, 
upon  the  Campus  Martins,  by  the  Pontifices  and  the  Flamen  Martis 
A.ugustus,  after  the  defeat  of  L.  Antonius,  immolated  four  hundred 
senators  and  knights  upon  the  altar  of  the  deified  Julius,  at  the  Ides  of 
March,  713,  or  41  years  before  Christ.*  Even  in  the  times  of  Adrian, 
the  beautiful  Antinous  died  a  voluntary  sacrifice  for  the  Emperor;  and 
the  annual  immolation  of  men  to  Jupiter  Latiaris,  upon  the  Alban 
Mount,  is  said  to  have  continued  even  into  the  thii'd  century  of  our 
era.  As  it  was  in  Greece  and  Rome,  so  it  was  among  almost  all  the 
oriental  and  occidental  countries.  .  .  Not  any  and  every  human  be- 
ing was  immolated,  but  the  innocent  children  were  selected;  and 
among  these,  the  preference  was  given  to  the  only  child,  or  to  the 
first-born.  .  .  At  Carthage  there  was  a  metallic  statue  of  Chronos,  in 
a  bending  posture,  with  hands  stretched  out,  and  raised  upwards. 
This  statue  was  heated,  till  it  glowed,  by  a  kiln  beneath ;  into  its  armi- 
were  placed  the  children  destined  for  sacrifice ;  from  its  arms  they  fell 
into  the  gulf  of  fire  beneath,  dying  in  convulsions,  which  were  said  to 
be  of  laughter.  The  childless  were  wont  to  buy  children  of  the  poor. 
'  The  mother,'  says  Plutarch,  '  stands  by,  without  sheddiag  a  tear,  or 
uttering  a  sigh ;  around  the  image  of  the  god  all  resounds  with  tht 
noise  of  kettle-di'ums  and  flutes,  that  the  crying  and  wailing  be  not 
heard.'  "  .  .  Human  sacrifices  were  familiar,  also,  among  Egyptians 
Pei-sians,  Arabians,  and  the  Northern  nations  generally. — [Prof.  Ernsi 
von  Lasaulx:  quoted,  with  ample  references,  in  Thomson's  Bampton 
Lects. ;  London  ed.,  1853:  pp.  255-263. 

**  In  the  year  270  A.D.,  further  proof  was  given  that,  in  spite  of  the 
late  decree  issued  by  Hadrian,  recourse  was  still  had  from  time  to  time 
to  this  means  of  appeasing  the  angry  gods  [by  human  sacrifice]  in  dan- 
gers threatening  the  state,  when,  on  an  irruption  of  the  Marcomanni, 
the  Emperor  Aurelian  offered  the  Senate  to  furnish  it  with  prisoners 


*  The  authorities  for  tlie  statement  conceraing  Augustus  are  Dio  Cassius 
XLnii. :  14 ;  Suetonius  (wlio  makes  the  number  three  hundred,  of  either  rank), 
(>eta7.  August.  XV. ;  and  Seneca,  De  Clem.  I.  11.  Suetonius  speaks  of  them  as 
•  slaugtitered  after  the  custom  of  sacrifices  [more  liostiarum]  at  an  altar  raised  to 
the  Divine  Julius  ';  snd  Seneca  distinguishes  between  the  Roman  blood  with  which 
Augustus  stained  the  Actian  sea,  the  life  which  he  destroyed  in  Sicilian  waters,  or 
in  his  prescriptions,  and  his  cruelty  at  the  Perusian  altars.  Probably  the  last  was 
an  act  of  political  vengeance,  to  which  a  sort  of  religious  sanction  was  sought  tc 
be  given. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  Ml 

of  all  nations  for  certain  expiatory  sacrifices  to  be  performed." — [Do! 
linger:  "  GentUe  and  Jew";  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  2:  p.  87. 

Eeferences  to  human  sacrifices  at  Rome  occur  in  Pliny,  Hist.  Nat. 
xxvin. :  3;  xxx. :  1;  and  m  Plutarch,  "Lives":  Boston  ed.,1859: 
Vol.  II. :  p.  240  ;  "Morals":  Boston  ed.,  1874  :  Vol.  U. :  p.  248. 

XII.  :  p.  108. — Among  the  notices  of  human  sacrifices,  and  of  the 
later  offerings  of  human  blood  to  the  gods,  T\hich  are  found  in  the 
Christian  Fathers,  are  the  following : — 

"  Why  did  we  not  even  publicly  profess  that  these  were  the  things 
which  we  esteemed  good,  and  prove  that  these  are  the  divine  philos- 
ophy, saying  that  the  mysteries  of  Saturn  are  performed  when  we 
slay  a  man,  and  that  when  we,  drink  our  fill  of  blood,  as  it  is  said  wo 
do,  we  are  doing  what  you  do  before  that  idol  you  honour,  and  on 
which  you  sprinkle  the  blood  not  only  of  irrational  animals,  but  also 
of  men,  making  a  libation  of  the  blood  of  the  slain  by  the  hand  of  the 
most  illustrious  and  noble  man  among  you." — [Justin  Martyr:  Apol. 
II. :  XII. 

"Wherefore,  having  seen  these  things,  and  moreover  also  having 
been  admitted  to  the  mysteries,  and  having  everywhere  examined  the 
religious  rites  performed  by  the  effeminate  and  the  pathic,  and  having 
found  among  the  Romans  their  Latiarian  Jupiter  delighting  in  human 
gore  and  the  blood  of  slaughtered  men,  and  Artemis  not  far  from  the 
gi^at  city  [at  Aricia]  sanctioning  acts  of  the  same  kind,  .  .  retiring 
by  myself  I  sought  how  I  might  be  able  to  discover  the  truth." — [Ta- 
tian:  "  To  the  Greeks  " :  xxix. 

"  Children  were  openly  sacrificed  in  Africa  to  Saturn  as  lately  as  the 
proconsulship  of  Tiberius,  who  exposed  to  public  gaze  the  priests 
susx)ended  on  the  sacred  trees  overshadowing  their  temple,  so  many 
crosses  on  which  the  punishment  which  justice  craved  overtook  their 
crimes ;  as  the  soldiers  of  our  country  still  can  testify,  who  did  that 
very  work  for  the  proconsul.  And  even  now  that  sacred  crime  still 
contmues  to  be  done  in  secret." — [Tertullian:  Apologet. :  ix. 

"  Among  the  people  of  Cyprus,  Teucer  sacrificed  a  human  victim  to 
Jupiter,  and  handed  down  to  posterity  that  sacrifice,  which  was  lately 
abolished  by  Hadrian,  when  he  was  emperor.  There  was  a  law  among 
the  people  of  Tauris,  a  fierce  and  inhuman  nation,  that  strangers  should 
be  sacrificed  to  Diana ;  and  this  sacrifice  was  practised  through  many 
ages.  .  .  Nor,  indeed,  were  the  Latins  free  from  this  cruelty,  since 
Jupiter  Latialis  is  even  now  worshipped  with  the  offering  of  human 
blood.  ,  .  Are  not  our  countrymen,  who  have  always  claimed  for 
themselves  the  glory  of  gentleness  and  civilization,  found  to  be  more 
inhuman  by  these  sacrilegious  rites? " — [Lactantius :  ' '  Div.  Institutes  "; 
I..  21. 


442  APPENDIX 

XIII. :  p.  108. — "  Marius,  finding  himself  hard  put  to  it  in  the  Cim- 
brian  war  had  it  revealed  to  him  in  a  dream,  that  he  shoulc  overconi€ 
his  enemies  if  he  would  but  sacrifice  his  daughter  Calpumia.  He  did 
it,  preferring  the  common  safety  before  any  private  bond  of  Nature, 
and  he  got  the  victory.  There  are  two  altars  in  Germany,  where  aboui 
that  time  of  the  year  may  be  heard  the  sound  of  trumpets." — pElef.  to 
Dorotheus'  Italian  History.]  [Plutarch:  "Parallels":  Boston  ed., 
*' Morals":  1874  :  Vol.  5  :  p.  463. 

XIV. :  p.  109. — "He  [Julian,  when  preparing  for  his  Persian  expedi- 
tion] offered  repeated  victims  on  the  altar  of  the  gods ;  sometimes  sac- 
rificing one  hundred  bulls,  and  countless  flocks  of  animals  of  all  kinds, 
and  white  birds,  which  he  sought  for  everywhere  by  land  and  sea;  so 
that  every  day  individual  soldiers  who  had  stuffed  themselves  like 
boors  with  too  much  meat  [at  the  idol-feasts],  or  who  were  senseless 
from  the  eagerness  with  which  they  had  drunk,  were  placed  on  the 
shoulders  of  passers-by,  and  carried  to  their  homes  through  the  streets 
from  the  public  temples  where  they  had  indulged  in  feasts  which  do- 
served  punishment  rather  than  indulgence." — [Ammian.  Marcellin. : 
^' Roman  History":  xxii. :  12  :  6. 

XV. :  p.  109. — "  Let  it  be  argued,  as  it  easily  may — ^very  learnedly — 
on  grounds  metaphysical,  and  on  grounds  ethical,  that  the  Christian 
doctrine  of  Propitiation  for  sin  (stated  without  reserve)  is  '  absurd,'  and 
that  it  is  'impossible,'  and  that  it  is  'immoral,'  and  that  it  is  every- 
thing that  ought  to  be  reprobated,  and  to  be  met  with  an  indignant 
rejection: — ^let  all  such  things  be  said,  and  they  will  be  said  to  the 
world's  end — it  will  to  the  world's  end  also  be  true  that  each  human 
spirit,  when  awakened  toward  God,  as  to  His  moral  attributes,  finds 
rest  in  that  same  doctrine  of  the  vicarious  sufferings  of  the  Divine 
Person,  and  finds  no  rest  until  it  is  there  found." — [Isaac  Taylor  : 
"Restoration  of  Behef  ";  Boston  ed.,  1867  :  p.  320. 

XVI.:  p.  110. — "He,  therefore,  our  God  and  Lord,  .  .  declaring 
Himself  constituted  a  priest  forever,  offered  up  to  God  the  Father  His 
own  body  and  blood  under  the  species  of  bi^'ead  and  wine :  and  under 
the  symbols  of  these  same  things  He  delivered  His  own  body  and  blood 
to  be  received  by  His  apostles,  whom  He  then  constituted  priests  of  the 
New  Testament ;  and  He  commanded  them,  and  their  successors  in  the 
priesthood,  to  offer  them ;  even  as  the  Catholic  Church  has  always  un- 
derstood and  taught.  .  .  And  forasmuch  as,  in  this  divine  sacrifice 
which  is  celebrated  in  the  mass,  that  same  Christ  is  contained  and  im- 
molated in  an  unbloody  manner,  who  once  offered  HimseK  in  a  bloody 
manner  on  the  altar  of  the  cross ;  the  holy  Synod  teaches,  that  this 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  44^ 

sacrifice  is  truly  propitiatory,  and  that  by  means  of  it  this  is  effected, 
that  we  obtain  mercy,  and  find  grace  in  seasonable  aid,  if  we  draw 
nigh  unto  God,  contrite  and  penitent,  with  a  sincere  heart  and  upright 
faith,  with  fear  and  reverence." — [Canons  and  Decrees  of  Council  of 
Trent :  Sess.  XXII. :  cc.  1,  2. 

XVn. :  p.  112. — "ShaU  I  offer  victims  and  sacrifices  to  the  Lord, 
«iich  as  He  has  produced  for  my  use,  that  I  should  throw  back  to  Him 
His  own  gifts  ?  It  is  ungrateful,  when  the  victim  proper  for  sacrifice  is 
a  good  disposition,  and  a  pure  mind,  and  a  sincere  judgment  [or  con- 
science]. Therefore  he  who  cultivates  innocence  supplicates  God;  he 
who  cultivates  justice  makes  offerings  to  God ;  he  who  abstains  from 
fraudulent  practices  propitiates  God ;  he  who  snatches  man  from  dan- 
ger slaughters  the  most  acceptable  victim.  These  are  our  sacrifices, 
these  are  our  rites  of  God's  worship ;  thus,  among  us,  he  who  is  most 
just  is  he  who  is  most  religious. " — [Minucius  Felix :  ' '  Octavius  " :  xxxii. 

"  I  believe  that  the  true  Christian  philosopher  cannot  but  discern, 
through  all  the  deviations  and  all  the  aberrations  in  that  history  of  the  re- 
ligious mind  which  he  has  to  observe  and  to  record  during  fifteen  cen- 
turies, and  through  all  the  bitter  contention  and  conflicting  anathemas  of 
priests  and  theologians,  .  .  one  sublime  and  original  thought,  which, 
even  in  dark  misunderstanding  and  in  deep  corruption,  constitutes  the 
redeeming  feature  and  the  Divine  power  in  the  minds  of  believers. 
This  thought  is  nothing  less  than  that  great  fundamental  Christian 
idea  of  the  reunion  of  the  mind  of  mortal  man  with  God,  by  thank- 
ful sacrifice  of  self,  in  life,  and  therefore  also  in  worship.  The  criti- 
cally sifted  and  restored  documents  which  I  subjoin,  [Eeliquiae  Litur- 
gicaej^-speak  that  language  with  touching  simplicity  and  irresistible 
energy." — [Bunsen  :  "  Christianity  and  Mankind " :  London  ed.,  1854: 
Vol.  7  :  p.  4. 

XVIII. :  p.  113. — "Many  stories  are  related  of  his  youthful  piety,  his 
self-inflicted  austerities,  and  his  charity.  One  day  he  met  a  poor 
v/oman  weeping  bitterly;  and  when  he  inquired  the  cause,  she  told 
him  that  her  only  brother,  her  sole  stay  and  support  in  the  world,  had 
been  carried  into  captivity  by  the  Mooi'S.  Dominick  could  not  ransom 
her  brother  ;  he  had  given  away  all  his  money,  and  even  sold  his  books 
to  relieve  the  poor;  but  he  offered  all  he  could, — he  offered  himself,  to 
be  exchanged  as  a  slave  in  place  of  her  brother.  The  woman,  aston- 
ished at  such  a  proposal,  fell  upon  her  knees  before  him." — [Mrs.  Jame- 
son :  "Legends  of  Monastic  Orders";  London  ed.,  1872  :  p.  360. 

A  picture  in  one  of  the  lunettes  of  the  great  cloister  in  the  convent 
of  San  Marco  at  Florence,  conmiemorates  this  action,  early  ascribed 
to  the  founder  of  the  Dominicans  who  long  occupied  the  convent. 


4AA  APPENDIX. 

XIX. :  p.  114. — "  '  Do  not  imagine,'  writes  the  Father  Superior,  '  that 
the  rage  of  the  Iroquois,  and  the  loss  of  many  Christians  and  many 
catechumens,  can  bring  to  nought  the  mystery  of  the  cross  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  the  efficacy  of  his  blood.  We  shall  die  ;  we  shall  be 
captured,  burned,  butchered:  be  it  so.  Those  who  die  in  theii^  beds  do 
not  always  die  the  best  death.  I  see  none  of  our  company  cast  down. 
On  the  contrary,  they  ask  leave  to  go  up  to  the  Hurons,  and  some  of 
them  protest  that  the  fires  of  the  Iroquois  are  one  of  their  motives  for 
the  journey.  .  .  Thus  died  Jean  de  Brebeuf,  the  founder  of  the  Huron 
mission,  its  truest  hero,  and  its  greatest  martyr.  He  came  of  a  noble 
race, — the  same,  it  is  said,  from  which  sprang  the  English  Earls  of 
Arundel ;  but  never  had  the  mailed  barons  of  his  line  confronted  a  fate 
so  appalling,  with  so  prodigious  a  constancy.  To  the  last  he  refused 
to  flinch,  and  '  his  death  was  the  astonishment  of  his  murderers. '  .  . 
Lalemant,  physically  weak  from  childhood,  and  slender  almost  to 
emaciation,  was  constitutionally  unequal  to  a  display  of  fortitude  like 
that  of  his  colleague.  .  .  It  was  said  that,  at  times,  he  seemed  beside 
himself  :  then,  rallying,  with  hands  uplifted,  he  oft'ered  his  sufferings 
to  Heaven  as  a  sacrifice." — [Parkman  :  "  Jesuits  in  North  America"; 
Boston  ed.,  1880:  pp.  316,  389-91:  see,  also,  pp.  98,  214-33,  252-5,  303- 
5;  405-7;  et  al. 

XX.:  p.  116. — "I  do  not  believe  the  ancients  ever  did  use  simul- 
taneous harmony,  that  is,  music  in  different  parts ;  for  without  thirds 
and  sixths  it  must  have  been  insipid ;  and  with  them  the  combination 
of  many  sounds  and  melodies,  moving  by  different  intervals,  and  in 
different  time,  would  have  occasioned  a  confusion,  which  the  respect 
that  the  Greeks  had  for  their  language  and  poetry  would  not.  suffer 
them  to  tolerate. "— [Charles  Bumey:  "Hist,  of  Music";  London  ed., 
1776:  Vol.  1:  p.  149. 

"  Greek  music  was  confined  to  twanging  the  gut-strings  of  instru- 
ments made  in  the  fashion  of  either  the  harp  or  the  guitar,  and  to 
blowing  reeds  or  pipes,  analogous  to  the  principle  of  our  fife  or  flute, 
and  our  clarinette  or  hautboy.  .  .  I  feel  therefore  obliged  to  conclude, 
upon  the  evidence  before  us,  that  in  the  great  days  of  Terpander,  Al- 
cseus,  Sappho,  and  Pindar,  there  was  little  that  we  could  call  harmony, 
and  that  Music  was  practically  in  a  rude  state."— [Mahaffy:  "Kamblea 
and  Studies  in  Greece";  London  ed.,  1878:  pp.  436,  450. 

"  As  to  the  practice  of  music,  it  seems  to  have  been  carried  to  no 
very  great  degree  of  perfection  by  the  Romans ;  the  tibia  and  the  lyre 
seem  to  have  been  the  only  instruments  in  use  among  them,  and  on 
these  there  were  no  performers  of  such  distinguished  merit  as  to  render 
them  worthy  of  the  notice  of  posterity.  .  .  Further  we  may  venture 
to  assert,  that  neither  their  religious  solemnities,  nor  their  triumphs, 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  445 

their  shows,  or  theatrical  representations,  splendid  as  they  were,  con- 
tributed in  the  least  to  the  improvement  of  music,  either  in  theory  or 
practice." — [Hawkins:  "Gen.  Hist,  of  Music";  London  ed.,  1776:  Vol. 
1:  pp.  xlv.,  xlviii. 

"Perhaps  no  one  thing  is  more  likely  to  strike  the  reader  in  the 
foregoing  account  than  the  very  limited  amount  of  invention  among 
the  Greeks,  if  there  was  even  any  at  all,  as  to  musical  instruments. 
These  seem  to  be  all  Asiatic  or  African.  Even  the  word  '  lyre '  haa 
not  been  traced  to  a  Greek  root,  and  we  have  representations  of  many- 
stringed  lyres  in  Egyptian  paintings  before  the  Greeks  were  a  nation. 
.  .  We  can  find  no  new  principle  for  stringed  instruments  discovered 
by  a  Greek,  nor  anything  new  in  pipes.  All  was  ready  made  for 
them,  together  with  their  system  of  music.  The  Greeks  were  even 
inapt  pupils  ;  for  although  they  had  many  strings  ever  before  theh' 
eyes,  they  did  but  reduce  the  number,  after  a  time,  to  bring  the  instru- 
ments down  to  theii'  own  level.  They  practised  a  certain  amount  of 
harmony,  but  not  so  much  as  earlier  nations.  .  .  On  a  first  perusal 
of  Greek  authors  on  music,  I  had  formed  a  much  higher  estimate  of 
the  nation,  in  comparison  with  others,  than  a  subsequent  more  general 
acquaintance  will  sustain.  .  .  The  Greeks  played  and  sang  in  minor 
keys  only,  and  their  Seventh  of  the  key  was  the  old  minor  Seventh,  a 
whole  tone  below  the  octave,  in  ascending  as  well  as  descending." — 
[ChappeU:  "  Hist,  of  Music";  London  ed.,  1874:  Vol.  1:  pp.  302,  25. 

"  It  has  been  already  stated  that  the  musical  scale  and  instruments 
of  the  Gi'eeks,  originally  very  narrow,  were  materially  enlarged  by 
borrowing  from  Phrygia  and  Lydia  ;  and  these  acquisitions  seem  to 
have  been  first  reahzed  about  the  beginning  of  the  seventh  centmy 
B.C.,  thi'ough  the  Lesbian  player  Torpander,  the  Phrygian  (or  Greco- 
Phrygian)  flute-player  Olympus,  and  the  Arkadian  or  Boeotian  flute- 
player  Klonas." — [Grote  :  "History  of  Greece";  London  ed.,  1872: 
Vol.3:  p.  299. 

For  the  great  indebtedness  of  the  Greeks  to  the  Egyptians,  in  regard 
to  music,  see  Chappell's  "History  of  Music,"  London  ed.,  1874:  Vol. 
1,  pp.  47,  52,  60,  66,  et  al. 

XXI.  :  p.  117. — "We  must  however  make  some  allusion  to  the 
origin  of  this  custom  in  the  church,  of  singing  responsive  hymns.  Ig- 
natius, third  bishop  of  Antioch  in  Syria  from  the  apostle  Peter,  who 
also  had  conversed  familiarly  with  the  apostles  themselves,  saw  a  vision 
of  angels  hymning  in  alternate  chants  the  Holy  Trinity :  after  which  he 
introduced  the  mode  of  singing  which  he  had  observed  in  the  vision 
into  the  Antiochian  Church,  whence  it  was  transmitted  by  tradition  to 
all  the  other  churches.  Such  is  the  account  which  we  have  received 
in  i"clation  to  these  responsive  hymns." — [Socrates :  Eccl.  Hist. :  VI. :  8, 


446  APPENDIX. 

"  The  organ,  that  special  creation  of  Christian  art,  aione  worthy  tc 
mingle  its  mystic  voice  with  the  pomp  of  the  only  truly  divine  wor- 
ship,— the  organ  owes  to  the  monks  the  perfection  of  its  construction; 
and  it  is  owing  to  them  that  it  passed  into  general  use.  Cassiodorus, 
an  illustrious  monk  of  the  sixth  century,  has  given  at  once  the  most 
ancient  and  the  most  exact  description  of  this  king  of  instruments.  .  . 
Thus  it  is  to  an  illustrious  monk,  St.  Gregory  the  Great,  that  ecclesi- 
astical music,  the  highest  expression  of  the  art,  owes  its  origin.  It  is 
to  a  monk  [Guido  Aretino]  that  modern  music  owes  the  increase  of 
simplicity  which  has  made  its  study  less  difficult.  They  were  monks 
who  in  the  solitude  of  the  Thebaid,  as  well  as  in  the  monasteries  of  the 
Black  Forest,  during  fourteen  hundred  years,  enriched  the  store  of 
musical  science  by  their  researches  and  their  treatises.  They  were, 
finally,  poor  monks  who  from  the  eighth  to  the  twelfth  century  com- 
posed, in  the  solitude  of  the  cloister  and  under  the  inspiration  of 
prayer,  those  immortal  masterpieces  of  the  Catholic  liturgy,  misunder- 
stood, mutilated,  parodied  or  proscribed  by  the  barbarous  taste  of  mod- 
ern liturgists,  but  in  which  true  knowledge  does  not  hesitate  to  ac- 
knowledge in  our  days  an  ineffable  delicacy  of  expression,  an  inimita- 
ble mingling  of  the  pathetic  and  the  powerful,  the  flowing  and  the 
profound,  a  soft  and  penetrating  strength,  and,  to  say  all  in  few  words, 
a  beauty  always  natural,  always  fresh,  always  pure,  which  never  be- 
comes insipid,  and  which  never  grows  old."— [Montalembert:  "Monks 
of  the  West";  London  ed.,  1879:  Vol.  VI. :  pp.  241-2,  245-6. 

XXII. :  p.  117. — "At  the  time  of  the  institution  of  the  Cantus  Am- 
brosianus,  an  order  of  clergy  was  also  established,  whose  employment 
it  was  to  perform  such  parts  of  the  service  as  were  required  to  be  sung. 
These  were  called  Psalmistse  ;  and  though  by  Bellarmine  and  a  few 
other  writers  they  are  confounded  with  the  Lectors,  yet  were  they  by 
the  canonists  accounted  a  separate  and  distinct  order." — [Hawkins  : 
"  History  of  Music";  London  ed.,  1776:  Vol.  1:  p.  1. 

"The  first  rise  and  institution  of  these  singers  [Psalmistse],  as  an 
order  of  the  clergy,  seems  to  have  been  about  the  beginning  of  the 
fourth  century.  For  the  Council  of  Laodicea  is  the  fii^t  that  mentions 
them,  unless  any  one  thinks  perhaps  the  Apostolical  Canons  to  be  a 
little  more  ancient.  The  reason  of  instituting  them  seems  to  have 
been  to  regulate  and  encourage  the  ancient  psalmody  of  the  church. 
For  from  the  first  and  apostolical  age  singing  was  always  a  part  of 
Divine  service,  in  which  the  whole  body  of  the  church  joined  together. 
.  ,  In  after  ages  we  find  the  people  enjoyed  their  ancient  privilege  oi 
singing  all  together  ;  which  is  frequently  mentioned  by  St.  Austin, 
Ambrose,  Chrysostom,  Basil,  and  many  others,  who  give  an  account 
of  the  psalmody  and  service  of  the  church  in  their  own  ages." — [Bing* 
ham:  "Antiq.  of  Christ.  Church":  B.  III.:  chap.  vil. 


NOTE^  TO  LECTURE  IV.  447 

"  How  greatly  did  I  weep  in  Thy  hymns  and  canticles,  deeply  moved 
by  the  voices  of  Thy  sweet-speaking  church  !  The  voices  flowed  into 
mine  ears,  and  the  truth  was  poured  forth  into  my  heart,  whence 
the  agitation  of  my  piety  overflowed,  and  my  tears  ran  over ;  and 
blessed  was  I  therein  !  .  .  At  this  time  [under  Ambrose]  it  was  inst:.- 
tuted  that,  after  the  manner  of  the  Eastern  Church,  hymns  and  psalms 
should  be  sung,  lest  the  people  should  pine  away  in  the  tediousness  ol 
sorrow:*  which  custom,  retained  from  then  till  now,  is  imitated  bj 
many,  yea,  by  almost  all  of  Thy  congregations  throughout  the  rest  of 
the  world." — [Augustine:  "Confessions":  IX.:  6,  7. 

XXIII. :  p.  118. — "  We  no  longer  employ  the  ancient  psaltery,  and 
trumpet,  and  timbrel,  and  flute,  which  those  expert  in  war  and  con- 
temners of  the  fear  of  God  were  wont  to  make  use  of  in  the  choruses 
at  their  festive  assemblies.  But  let  our  genial  feeling  in  drinking  be 
twofold,  in  accordance  with  the  law.  For  if  *  thou  shalt  love  the  Lord 
thy  God,'  and  then  'thy  neighbour,'  let  its  first  manifestation  be 
toward  God,  in  thanksgiving  and  psalmody,  and  the  second  towards 
our  neighbour  in  decorous  fellowship." — [Clement  of  Alex.  :  "In- 
structor": II.:  4. 

"  Whatever  remains  of  the  day,  now  that  the  sun  is  sloping  toward 
the  evening,  let  us  spend  it  in  gladness,  nor  let  even  the  hour  of  repast 
be  without  heavenly  grace.  Let  the  temperate  meal  resound  with 
psalms.  You  will  provide  a  better  entertainment  for  your  dearest 
friends,  if,  while  we  have  something  spiritual  to  listen  to,  the  sweet- 
ness of  rehgious  music  charm  our  ears."— [Cyprian:  Ep.  ad  Donat.  16. 

"Between  the  two  [husband  and  wife]  echo  psalms  and  hymns;  and 
they  mutually  challenge  each  other  which  shall  better  chant  to  their 
Lord.  Such  things,  when  Christ  sees  and  hears.  He  joys.  To  these 
He  sends  His  own  peace." — [Tertullian:  ad  Uxor. :  II. :  8. 

"His  palace  [that  of  Theodosius  Junior]  was  so  regulated  that  it  dif- 
fered little  from  a  monastery;  for  he,  together  with  his  sisters,  rose 
early  in  the  morning,  and  recited  responsive  hymns,  in  praise  of  the 
Deity."— [Socrates:  Eccl.  Hist.:  vil. :  22. 

"We  ourselves  have  observed,  when  on  the  spot  [in  the  Thebaid], 
many  crowded  together  in  one  day,  some  suffering  decapitation,  some 
the  torments  of  flames ;  so  that  the  murderous  weapon  was  completely 
blunted,  and  having  lost  its  edge  broke  in  pieces ;  and  the  executioners 
themselves,  wearied  with  slaughter,  were  obliged  to  relieve  one  an- 
other.    Then,  also,  we  were  witnesses  to  the  most  admirable  ardor  of 


*  Soldiers  at  the  time  surrounded  the  Basilica,  to  prevent  the  congregation  from 
leaving  it.  The  people  and  the  Bishop  remained  thus  shut  up,  in  the  buildings  be 
longing  to  it,  for  several  daj's. 


i48  ,       APPENDIX. 

mind,  and  tlie  truly  divine  energy  and  alacrity,  of  those  that  believed 
in  the  Christ  of  God.  .  .  They  received,  indeed,  the  final  sentence  of 
death  with  gladness  and  exultation,  so  far  as  even  to  sing  and  send  up 
hymns  of  praise  and  thanksgiving,  until  they  breathed  their  last." — 
[Eusebius:  Eccl.  Hist.:  vra. :  9. 

"  I  shall  say  nothing  of  what  he  [the  elder  Valentinian]  did  at  An- 
tioch,  except  to  mention  his  being  struck  with  wonder  at  the  freedorr. 
and  cheerfulness  of  one  most  faithful  and  steadfast  young  man,  who, 
when  many  were  seized  to  be  tortured,  was  tortured  during  a  whole 
day,  and  sang  imder  the  instrument  of  torture,  etc." — [Augustine : 
Civ.  Dei ;  xvin. :  52. 

XXIV. :  p.  118. — From  the  multitudinous  testimonies  of  great  Chris- 
tian writers  to  the  spiritual  efficacy  of  music,  three  may  be  selected : — 

"  I  am  no  musician,  and  want  a  good  ear,  yet  I  am  conscious  of  a 
power  in  music  which  I  want  words  to  describe.  It  touches  chords, 
peaches  depths  in  the  soul,  which  lie  beyond  all  other  influences — ex- 
tends my  consciousness,  and  has  sometimes  given  me  a  pleasure  which 
I  have  found  in  nothing  else.  Nothing  in  my  experience  is  more  mys- 
terious, more  inexplicable.  An  instinct  has  always  led  men  to  transfer 
it  to  Heaven,  and  I  suspect  the  Christian  under  its  power  has  often  at- 
tained to  a  singular  consciousness  of  his  immortality.  Facts  of  this 
nature  make  me  feel  what  an  infinite  mystery  our  nature  is,  and  how 
little  our  books  of  science  reveal  it  to  us." — [Letter  of  Dr.  Channing: 
"  Life  of  J.  Blanco  White";  London  ed.,  1845:  Vol.  3:  p.  195. 

"  Let  us  take  another  instance,  of  an  outward  and  earthly  form,  or 
economy,  under  which  great  wonders  unknown  seem  to  be  typified ;  I 
mean  musical  sounds,  as  they  are  exhibited  most  perfectly  in  instru- 
mental harmony.  .  .  To  many  men  the  very  names  which  the  science 
employs  are  utterly  incomprehensible.  To  speak  of  an  idea  or  a  sub- 
ject seems  to  be  fanciful  or  trifling,  to  speak  of  the  views  which  it 
opens  upon  us  to  be  childish  extravagance ;  yet  is  it  possible  that  that 
inexhaustible  evolution  and  disposition  of  notes,  so  rich  yet  so  simple, 
so  intricate  yet  so  regulated,  so  various  yet  so  majestic,  should  be  a 
mere  sound,  which  is  gone  and  perishes  ?  Can  it  be  that  those  mys- 
terious stirrings  of  heart,  and  keen  emotions,  and  strange  yearnings 
after  we  know  not  what,  and  awful  impressions  from  we  know  not 
whence,  should  be  wrought  in  us  by  what  is  unsubstantial,  and  comes 
and  goes,  and  begins  and  ends  in  itself  ?  It  is  not  so  ;  it  cannot  be. 
No  :  they  have  escaped  from  some  higher  sphere  ;  they  are  the  out- 
pourings of  eternal  harmony,  in  the  medium  of  created  sound  ;  they 
are  echoes  from  our  Home ;  they  are  the  voice  of  Angels,  or  the  Mag- 
nificat of  Saints,  or  the  living  laws  of  Divine  Governance  or  the  Di- 
vine Attributes  ;   something  are  they  besides  themselves,  which  we 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  JV.  M9 

cannot  compass,  whicli  we  cannot  utter, — though  mortal  man,  and  he 
perhaps  not  otherwise  distinguished  above  his  fellows,  has  the  gift  of 
eliciting  them." — [J.  H.  Newman  :  "University  Sermons";  London 
ed.,1880:  pp.  346-7. 

' '  The  interim  of  convenient  rest  before  meat  may  both  with  profit 
and  delight  be  taken  up  in  recreating  and  composing  their  travailed 
spirits  with  the  solemn  and  divine  harmonies  of  Music  heard  or  learned  \ 
either  whilst  the  skillful  organist  plies  his  grave  and  fancied  descant 
in  lofty  fugues,  or  the  whole  symphony  with  artful  and  unimaginable 
touches  adorn  and  grace  the  well-studied  chords  of  some  choice  com- 
poser ;  sometimes  the  lute,  or  soft  organ-stop,  waiting  on  elegant  voices 
either  to  religious,  martial,  or  civil  ditties  ;  which,  if  wise  men  and 
prophets  be  not  extremely  out,  have  a  great  power  in  dispositions  and 
manners,  to  smooth  and  make  them  gentle  from  rustic  harshness  and 
distempered  passions." — [Milton:  "Of  Education":  Prose  Works; 
London  ed.,  1753:  Vol.  1:  p.  147. 

XXV.  :  p.  118. — "  The  excellence  of  the  Hebrew  devotional  hymns 
has  never  been  surpassed.  Heathenism,  Christianity,  with  all  their 
science,  arts,  literature,  bright  and  many-colored,  have  little  that  ap- 
proaches these.  They  are  the  despair  of  imitators;  still  the  uttered 
prayer  of  the  Christian  world.  Tell  us  of  Greece,  whose  air  was  redolent 
of  song;  its  language  such  as  Jove  might  speak;  its  sages,  heroes, 
poets,  honored  in  every  clime, — they  have  no  psalm  of  prayer  and 
praise  Hke  these  Hebrews,  the  devoutest  of  men,  who  saw  God  always 
before  them,  ready  to  take  them  up  when  father  and  mother  let  them 
fall."— [Theo.  Parker:  "Discourse  of  Eeligion";  Boston  ed.,  1843: 
p.  372. 

XXVI.  :  p.  118.— "St.  Jerome  tells  us  that  'at  the  funeral  of  the 
famous  lady,  Paula,  the  psalms  were  sung  in  Syriac,  Greek,  and  Latin, 
because  there  were  men  of  each  language  present  at  the  solemnity.' 
.  .  Aurelius  Cassiodore,  writing  upon  these  words  of  the  Psalmist, 
*  She  shall  be  brought  unto  the  king  in  raiment  of  divers  colors,'  says, 
'  This  variety  signified  that  diversity  of  tongues,  wherewith  every  na- 
tion sang  to  God  in  the  church,  according  to  the  difference  of  their 
own  country-language.'" — [Bingham:  "Antiq.  of  Christ.  Church": 
XIH:  4:  §1. 

XXVII.  :  p.  119. — Canon  Liddon  gives  the  following  examples  of 
"  early  apostolical  hymns,  sung,  as  it  would  seem,  in  the  Redeemer's 
honour " : — 

1  Tunothy  1  :  15;  3  :  16;  2  Timothy  2  :  11-13;  Titus  3  :  4-7;  Ephe- 
sians  5  :  14. — [Bampton  Lectures  ;  New  York  ed.,  1868:  p.  327-8. 
29 


4:50  APPENDIX. 

To  these  may  perhaps  be  added  1  Peter  3 :  10-13 ;  with  several  passages 
in  the  Apocalypse.— [See  Schaff :  "Hist,  of  Church":  Vol.  I. :  p.  464. 

XXVin. :  p.  119. — "Two  or  three  hymns  appear  to  have  come  down 
to  us  from  a  remote  antiquity.  Basil  [who  died  a.d.  379]  cites  an  Even- 
ing Hymn  by  some  unknown  author,  which  he  describes  as  in  his  timo 
very  ancient,  handed  down  from  their  fathers,  and  in  use  among  the 
people."— [Coleman:  "  Ancient  Christianity  " ;  Phila.  ed.,  1852:  p.  333. 

The  Greek  form  of  this  hymn  is  given  by  Daniel,  Thesaurus  Hymno- 
logicus,  ni. :  5 ;  and  the  following  is  one  of  the  translations  of  it: — 

"  Jesus  Christ,  Joyful  Light  of  the  holy  I  Glory  of  the  eternal,  heav- 
enly, holy,  blessed  Father!  Having  now  come  to  the  setting  of  the 
sun,  beholding  the  evening  light,  we  praise  the  Father,  and  the  Son, 
and  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God.  Thou  art  worthy  to  be  praised  of  sacred 
voices  at  all  seasons,  O  Son  of  God,  who  givest  life :  wherefore  the  uni- 
verse glorifieth  Thee." 

XXIX.  :  p.  119. — **  *  Early  in  the  morning  they  sing  a  hymn  of 
praise  to  Christ  as  to  a  God,'  are  the  words  of  Pliny.  In  the  most 
ancient  Greek  Church  this  Hymn  [the  Gloria  in  Excelsis]  is  entitled 
'  The  Morning  Hymn.'  The  contents  of  this  ascription  of  praise,  here 
given  in  its  original  form,  correspond  entirely  to  the  description  of 
Pliny.  Christ  is,  in  conjunction  with  the  Father,  the  object  of  invo- 
cation and  praise.  .  .  The  first  two  verses — the  angels'  song  of  praise 
In  the  second  chapter  of  Luke — are,  as  it  were,  the  text  for  this  more 
expansive  Christian  inspiration :  the  form  is  that  of  the  Jewish  psalm- 
ody."—[Bunsen:  "God  in  History";  London  ed.,  1870:  Vol.  3:  p.  59. 

XXX.  :  p.  119. — ^The  Hymn  of  Clement  has  been  translated  by  Dr. 
H.  M.  Dexter,  of  whose  fine  metrical  version  the  first  and  last  stanzas 

are  these: — 

"  Shepherd  of  tender  youth, 
Guiding  in  love  and  truth 

Through  devious  ways ; 
Christ,  our  triumphant  King, 
We  come  Thy  name  to  sing, 
Hither  our  children  bring, 
To  shout  Thy  praise  1 


•'  So  now,  and  till  we  die, 
Sound  we  Thy  praises  high, 

And  joyful  shig : 
Infants,  and  the  glad  throng 
Who  to  Thy  Church  belong, 
Unite  to  swell  the  song, 

To  Christ,  our  King  !  " 

[Scha£P :  ' '  Christ  in  Song  " ;  New  York 
ed.,  1868:  pp.  675-6. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  451 

"  WTiatever  psalms  and  hymns  were  written  by  the  brethren  from 
the  beginning,  celebrate  Christ,  the  Word  of  God,  by  asserting  hia 
Divinity." — [Quoted  by  Eusebius,  from  another  author:  Eccl.  Hist: 
V. :  28. 

XXXI. :  p.  119. — "  We  may  make  application  of  all  which  has  been 
here  said  to  the  metrical  forms  of  the  classical  poetry  of  Rome.  These 
the  Church  found  ready  made  to  her  hand,  and  in  their  kind  having 
reached  a  very  high  perfection.  .  .  But  these  which  she  thus  inher- 
ited, while  she  was  content  of  necessity  to  use,  yet  could  not  satisfy 
her.  The  Gospel  had  brought  into  men's  hearts  longings  after  the 
infinite  and  the  eternal,  which  were  strange  to  it,  at  least  in  their 
present  intensity,  until  now.  .  .  Now  heaven  had  been  opened,  and 
henceforward  the  mystical  element  of  modem  poetry  demanded  its 
rights ;  vaguer  but  vaster  thoughts  were  craving  to  find  the  harmonies 
to  which  they  might  be  married  forever.  The  boundless  could  not  be 
content  to  find  its  organ  in  that  of  which  the  very  perfection  lay  in 
its  limitations  and  its  bounds." — [Trench:  "Sacred  Latin  Poetry"; 
London  ed.,  1849:  pp.  7,  8. 

XXXII.  :  p.  120. — "It  [the  Apostles'  Creed]  is  not  a  logical  state- 
ment of  abstract  doctrines,  but  a  profession  of  living  facts  and  saving 
truths.  It  is  a  liturgical  poem,  and  an  act  of  worship.  .  .  It  is  intel- 
ligible and  edifying  to  a  child,  and  fresh  and  rich  to  the  profoundest 
Christian  scholar,  who,  as  he  advances  in  age,  delights  to  go  back  to 
primitive  foundations  and  first  principles.  It  has  the  fragrance  of  an- 
tiquity, and  the  inestimable  weight  of  universal  consent.  It  is  a  bond 
of  union  between  all  ages  and  sections  of  Christendom.  .  .  The 
Apostles'  Creed  is  no  piece  of  mosaic,  but  an  organic  unit,  an  instinct- 
ive work  of  art,  in  the  same  sense  as  the  Gloria  in  Excelsis,  the  Te 
Deum,  and  the  classical  prayers  and  hymns  of  the  Church." — [Schafi": 
"  Creeds  of  Christendom";  New  York  ed.,  1877:  Yol.  1:  pp.  15,23. 

"I  believe  the  words  of  the  Apostles'  Creed  to  be  the  work  of  the 
Holy  Ghost ;  the  Holy  Spirit  alone  could  have  enunciated  things  so 
grand,  in  terms  so  precise,  so  expressive,  so  powerful.  No  human 
creature  could  have  done  it,  nor  all  the  human  creatures  of  ten  thou- 
sand worlds.  This  Creed,  then,  should  be  the  constant  object  of  our 
most  serious  attention.  For  myself,  I  cannot  too  highly  admire  or 
venerate  it." — [Luther:  "Table-Talk":  cCLxrv. 

XXXIII.  :  p.  121. — "  It  is  now  thoroughly  recognized  that  there  are 
five  main  Groups,  or  Families,  of  Liturgies ;  which  are  distinguished 
from  each  other  chiefly,  though  not  solely,  by  the  different  arrange- 
ments of  their  parts.     Three  of  these  are  Oriental ;  one  holds  an  inter- 


4:52  APPENDIX. 

mediate  position ;  .  .  and  one  is  purely  Western.  It  is  not  easy  to  find 
a  satisfactory  nomenclature  for  these  Groups.  Sometimes  they  are 
connected  with  the  name  of  the  Apostle,  or  Apostolic  man,  who  evan- 
gelized the  locality  in  which  the  chief  Liturgy  of  each  group  is  sup- 
posed to  have  originated.  Sometimes  they  are  connected  with  the 
name  of  the  Mother  Church  to  which  each  chief  Liturgy  is  thought 
to  have  belonged,  viz.,  Jerusalem,  Alexandria,  Edessa,  Ephesus,  and 
Rome  respectively.  .  .  From  an  original  Greek  S.  James  sprang  the 
numerous  Syriac  Liturgies  (amounting  to  some  eighty)  and  the  Liturgy 
of  S.  Basil,  belonging  to  Cesarea,  and  thence  again  that  of  S.  Chrysos- 
tom,  belonging  to  Constantinople,  on  one  side,  and  the  Armenian 
Uturgy  on  the  other." — [Hammond:  "Liturgies,  Eastern  and  West- 
•jm";  Oxford  ed.,  1878:  pp.  xvi.,  xvii. 

XXXTV. :  p.  121. — * '  But  it  satisfies  me  [placet]  that  if  you  have  found 
any  thing,  whether  in  the  Roman,  the  Gallic,  or  any  other  church, 
which  may  better  please  Almighty  God,  you  shall  carefully  select  it, 
and  shall  establish,  by  special  instruction,  in  the  church  of  the  Eng- 
lish, which  is  yet  new  to  the  faith,  whatever  you  may  have  been  able 
to  collect  from  many  churches.  For  things  are  not  to  be  beloved  on 
account  of  localities,  but  places  are  to  be  loved  for  the  sake  of  good 
things.  Choose,  therefore,  from  individual  churches,  whatsoever 
things  are  pious,  are  religious,  are  correct;  and  these,  collected  as  into 
one  bouquet  [fasciculum],  place  in  customary  use  among  the  minds  of 
the  English." — [Gregory  the  Great :  Answer  to  Augustine's  Second 
Question.     Bede  :  Hist.  Eccles. :  I. :  xxvil. 

XXXV.:  p.  121. — "Of  the  petitions  which  are  comprised  in  our 
litany,  it  may  be  observed  that  they  are  generally  of  remote  antiquity 
in  the  English  church.  Mabillon  has  printed  a  litany  of  the  Church 
of  England,  written  probably  in  the  eighth  century,  which  contains  a 
large  part  of  that  which  we  repeat  at  the  present  day,  and  which  pre- 
serves exactly  the  same  form  of  petition  and  request  which  is  still  re- 
tained. The  still  more  ancient  litanies  of  the  abbey  of  Fulda,  of  the 
Ambrosian  missal,  and  of  Gelasius,  Patriarch  of  Rome,  together  with 
the  Diaconica  or  Irenica  of  the  liturgies  and  offices  of  the  churches  of 
Constantinople,  Csesarea,  Antioch,  Jerusalem,  etc. — all  these  ancient 
formularies  contain  very  much  the  same  petitions  as  the  English  lit- 
any. "—[Palmer : ' '  Origines  Liturgicse  " ;  Oxford  ed. ,  1836 :  Vol.  1 :  p.  288. 

XXXVI.:  p.  122. — "One  cannot  but  lament,  during  this  Paschal 
season,  the  utter  disuse  [in  the  English  service]  of  the  Alleluia,  which 
^ve  so  joyous  a  character  to  more  ancient  services.  So  deeply  was 
*his  felt  among  every  class  of  people  that  one  of  the  commonest  of 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  453 

April  flowers  still  retains,  in  Sussex,  the  name  of  Alleluia.  The  fare« 
well  to  Alleluia,  in  the  Mozarabic  rite,  is  touchingly  beautiful.  It  hera 
takes  place  on  the  first  Sunday  in  Lent,  the  ancient  commencement  of 
the  Fast.  After  that  noble  hymn,  the  Alleluia  Perenne,  the  Capitula 
are  as  follows: — 'Alleluia  in  heaven  and  in  earth;  it  is  perpetuated  in 
heaven,  it  is  sung  in  earth.  There  it  resounds  everlastingly  ;  here 
sweetly.  There  happily;  here  concordantly.  There  ineffably;  here 
earnestly.  There  without  syllables ;  here  in  musical  numbers.  There 
from  the  angels;  here  from  the  people.'  .  .  So  the  French  Breviaries, 
on  this  second  Sunday  after  Easter,  celebrate  the  return  of  Alleluia.  After 
the  beautiful  lesson  from  S.  Augustine — '  The  days  have  come  for  us  to 
sing  Alleluia.  Now  these  days  come  only  to  pass  away,  and  pass  away 
to  come  again,  and  typify  the  Day  which  does  not  come  and  pass 
away,  to  which,  when  we  shall  have  come,  clinging  to  it,  we  shall  not 
pass  away '—they  give  the  responses,  etc." — [J.  M.  Neale  :  "  Essays  on 
Liturgiology  " ;  London  ed.,  1867  :  pp.  65-6. 

XXXVII. :  p.  122. — ''They  [the  hours  of  prayer]  were  seven  in 
number.  Matins,  the  first,  third,  sixth,  and  ninth  hours,  vespers,  and 
compline.  Matins  were  divided  into  two  parts,  which  were  originally 
distinct  offices  and  hours ;  namely,  the  noctum,  and  matin  lauds.  The 
nocturns  or  vigils  were  derived  from  the  earliest  periods  of  Chris- 
tianity. .  .  The  lauds,  or  more  properly  matin  lauds,  followed  next 
after  the  nocturns,  and  were  supposed  to  begin  with  day-break.  .  . 
Prime,  or  the  first  hour,  followed  lauds.  This  was  first  appointed  as 
an  hour  of  prayer  in  the  monastery  of  Bethlehem,  about  the  beginning  of 
the  fif  tlk  century.  The  third,  sixth,  and  ninth  hours  of  prayer  are  spoken 
of  by  the  early  Fathers  of  the  second  and  third  centuries.  .  .  Vespers, 
or  evensong,  is  mentioned  by  the  most  ancient  Fathers.  .  .  Compline, 
or  completorium,  was  the  last  service  of  the  day.  This  hour  of  prayer 
was  first  appointed  by  the  celebrated  abbot  Benedict,  in  the  sixth 
century."— [Palmer :  "Origines  Liturgicae";  Oxford  ed.,  1836  :  Vol. 
1  :  pp.  201-4. 

The  sumptuous  richness  of  these  "Books  of  Horn's" — making  any 
elaborate  and  costly  elegance  of  modern  editions  de  luxe  common- 
place jn  comparison — shows  how  willing  a  minister  art  was  to  piety  in 
the  Middle  Age ;  perhaps  how  far  piety  had  become  the  fashion  with  tha 
wealthy.  In  the  catalogue  of  a  single  private  English  library — the 
"  Huth  Catalogue  " — which  happens  to  be  at  hand,  are  enumerated  and 
described  forty-four  copies  of  the  "Horae  Beatae  Mariae  Virginis,"  in 
different  languages,  and  the  following  abridged  description  of  one  of 
these  gives  only  a  fair  impression  of  a  large  class  of  such  dainty  and 
<jherished  volumes : — 

"A  splendidly  illuminated  MS.  on  230  leaves  of  fine  vellum,  by  a 


4:54  appendix:. 

Frencli  artist  of  the  first  excellence  (7  by  5  inclies).  This  beautiful 
volume  is  supposed  to  have  been  executed  for  Philip  de  Comines,  and 
presented  by  him  to  some  person  of  distinction.  The  large  miniatures 
are  thirty-seven  in  number,  and  many  of  them  represent  subjects  of 
very  unusual  occurrence.  [Among  them  are :  Salvator  Mundi,  most  ex- 
pressively painted,  with  gold  background ;  St.  John  in  Patmos,  with  a 
landscape  of  exquisite  beauty;  the  virgin  and  child,  in  a  jeweled 
frame ;  the  Adoration  of  the  Magi,  a  very  brilliant  and  delicate  paint- 
ing, with  exquisite  background ;  the  Agony  in  the  Garden,  a  wonder- 
fully painted  night-scene ;  St.  John  the  Baptist  in  the  Wilderness,  a 
work  of  great  beauty;  St.  Agatha  seated  in  a  garden,  in  a  golden  robe; 
etc.,  etc.]  Besides  these  exquisite  paintings,  there  are  borders  of  very 
great  beauty  round  every  page,  each  one  being  entirely  different. 
They  are  alternately  painted  in  brilliant  colors,  and  in  a  lustrous  brown, 
heightened  with  gold.  The  Calendar  is  also  treated  in  a  similar 
manner." 

A  copy  of  the  mere  modern  fac-simile  of  the  famous  "Hours  of 
Anne  of  Brittany,"  made  by  M.  Curmer  in  Paris,  in  1861,  has  a  com- 
mercial value  reckoned  in  hundreds  of  dollars. 

XXXVIII. :  p.  123. — "Animism  is  not  itself  a  religion,  but  a  sort  of 
primitive  philosophy,  which  not  only  controls  religion,  but  rules  the 
whole  life  of  the  natural  man.  It  is  the  belief  in  the  existence  of  souls 
or  spirits,  of  which  only  the  powerful — those  on  which  man  feels  him- 
self dependent,  and  before  which  he  stands  in  awe — acquire  the  rank  of 
divine  beings,  and  become  objects  of  worship.  These  spirits  are  con- 
ceived as  moving  freely  through  earth  and  air,  and,  either  of  their 
own  accord,  or  because  conjured  by  some  spell,  and  thus  under  com- 
pulsion, appealing  to  men.  But  they  may  also  take  up  their  abode,  either 
temporarily  or  permanently,  in  some  object,  whether  hving  or  lifeless 
it  matters  not ;  and  this  object,  as  endowed  with  higher  power,  is  then 
worshipped,  or  employed  to  protect  individuals  and  communities." — 
[Tiele  :  "Hist,  of  Religion";  Boston  ed.,  1881  :  p.  9. 

' '  To  worship  private  gods,  or  new  gods,  or  foreign  gods,  brings  in  a 
confusion  of  religions,  with  unknown  ceremonies  not  recognised  by 
the  priests.  It  is  accordingly  proper  that  one  worship  the  gods  accepted 
by  our  ancestors,  as  they  themselves  submitted  to  this  law.  .  .  The 
Greeks,  and  we  after  them,  judge  better  [than  do  the  Persian  Magi,  who 
esteem  the  whole  earth  the  common  temple  and  house  of  the  gods] ; 
who,  in  order  to  augment  piety  toward  the  gods,  have  preferred  that 
they  should  inhabit  the  same  cities  which  we  ourselves  do.  For  this 
opinion  advances  religion  as  a  matter  of  great  advantage  to  cities."— 
[Cicero  :  De  Legibus  :  II. :  10,  11. 

"We  have  already  seen  that  tlie  proper  destination  of  the  Hellenic 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  455 

temples  was  not  to  serve  as  places  of  religious  assembly  for  public  devo* 
tion,  but  that  they  secured  a  shelter  for  the  image  of  the  god,  and  a  habi- 
tation for  the  deity  supposed  to  be  attached  to  his  image.  .  .  In  fact 
they  attributed  to  the  hallowing  rite,  or  consecration,  by  which  the  statue 
\\'hen  finished  was  fitted  for  religious  purposes,  the  power  to  attract 
the  deity  himself,  so  that  he  dwelt  in  the  image  as  the  soul  does  in  the 
body.  .  .  Thus  the  blessing  of  the  image  was  described  [by  Minucius] 
as  the  act  whereby  the  god  was  inducted  into  the  image,  and  had  a 
particular  abode  assigned  to  him." — [Dollinger  :  "  The  Gentile  and  the 
Jew";  London  ed.,  1862  :  Vol.  1:  pp.  239,  241. 

XXXIX.:  p.  125. — "On  the  day  when  he  pronounced  these  words 
['  the  true  worshippers  shall  worship  the  Father  in  spirit  and  in  truth '], 
he  was  indeed  the  Son  of  God.  He  for  the  first  time  gave  utterance  to  the 
idea  upon  which  shall  rest  the  edifice  of  the  everlasting  religion.  He 
founded  the  pure  worship,  of  no  age,  of  no  clime,  which  shall  be  that 
of  all  lofty  souls  to  the  end  of  time.  Not  only  was  his  religion,  that 
day,  the  benign  religion  of  humanity,  but  it  was  the  absolute  religion : 
and  if  other  planets  have  inhabitants  endowed  with  reason  and  moral- 
ity, their  religion  cannot  be  different  from  that  which  Jesus  proclaimed 
at  Jacob's  well.  Man  has  not  been  able  to  abide  by  this  worship  :  we 
attain  the  ideal  only  for  a  moment.  .  .  But  the  gleam  shall  become  the 
full  day,  and,  after  passing  through  all  the  circles  of  error,  humanity 
will  return  to  these  words,  as  to  the  immortal  expression  of  its  faith 
and  its  hopes." — [Renan  :  "Life  of  Jesus";  New  York  ed.,  1864: 
p.  215. 

XL.:  p.  126. — "The  church  is  itseK  this  drama.  It  is  a  petrified 
mystery,  a  Passion  in  stone  :  or,  rather,  it  is  the  Sufferer  himseK.  The 
whole  edifice,  amid  the  austerity  of  its  architectural  geometry,  is  as  a 
living  human  body.  The  nave,  extending  its  two  arms,  is  the  Man  on 
the  cross  :  the  cr j^t,  the  subterranean  church,  is  the  Man  in  the  tomb  : 
the  tower,  the  spire — it  is  still  He,  but  erect,  and  rising  to  heaven.  In 
the  choir,  which  declines  in  the  direction  of  the  nave,  you  see  His 
head  drooping  in  the  agony  :  you  recognize  His  blood  in  the  vivid 
purple  of  the  windows.  .  .  There  is  something  here  stronger  than  arms 
of  Titans  :  What  is  it  ?  The  breath  of  the  Spirit !  That  light  breath 
which  passed  before  the  face  of  Daniel,  carrying  away  kingdoms  and 
dashing  empires  to  pieces,  it  is  that  which  has  swelled  these  vaulted 
arches,  and  wafted  these  towers  to  the  sky.  It  has  penetrated  every 
part  of  this  vast  body  with  a  powerful  and  harmonious  life,  and  has 
drawn  out  of  a  grain  of  mustard  seed  the  vegetation  of  this  marvellous 
tree.  .  .  Ascend  to  those  aerial  deserts,  to  the  last  points  of  the  spires, 
where  only  the  slater  mounts,  in  danger  and  with  trembling,  you  will 


456  APPENDIX. 

often  find — left  alone,  under  God's  eye,  to  the  stroke  of  tlie  eternal 
winds — some  delicate  piece  of  workmanship,  some  masterpiece  of  sculi> 
tured  art,  in  carving  which  the  devout  workman  has  occupied  his  life. 
Not  a  name  is  on  it,  not  a  mark,  not  a  letter  :  he  would  have  thought 
such  a  thing  something  subtracted  from  the  glory  of  God  " ! — [Michelet: 
"  Histoire  de  France  " ;  Paris  ed.,  1855:  Tom.  II.:  pp.  ^2,  673,  683. 

XLI. :  p.  127. — "When  the  pei'son  that  descended  to  Trophoniua 
returns,  tlie  sacriflcers  immediately  place  him  on  a  throne,  which  they 
call  the  throne  of  Mnemosyne,  and  which  stands  not  far  from  the  ady- 
tum. Then  they  ask  him  what  he  has  either  seen  or  heard,  and  after- 
wards deliver  him  to  cei-tain  persons  who  bring  him  to  the  temple  of 
Good  Fortune,  and  the  Good  Daemon,  while  he  is  yet  full  of  terror,  and 
without  any  knowledge  either  of  himself  or  of  those  that  are  near  him. 
Afterwards,  however,  he  recovers  the  use  of  his  reason,  and  laughs  just 
the  same  as  before.  I  write  this  not  from  hearsay,  but  from  what  I 
have  seen  happen  to  others,  and  from  what  I  experienced  myself  when. 
I  consulted  the  oracle  of  Trophonius." — [Pausanius:  "Descript.  of 
Greece":  IX.:  39. 

"We  went,  first  of  all,  to  see  the  site  of  Trophonius'  oracle.  As  the 
gorge  becomes  narrower,  there  is,  on  the  right  side,  a  small  cave,  from 
which  a  sacred  stream  flows  to  join  the  larger  river.  Here  numerous 
square  panels,  cut  into  the  rock  to  hold  votive  tablets,  now  gone,  indi- 
cate a  sacred  place  to  which  pilgrims  came  to  ofPer  prayers  for  aid,  and 
thanksgiving  for  success.  The  actual  seat  of  the  oracle  is  not  certain, 
and  is  supposed  to  be  some  cave  or  aperture  now  covered  by  the  Turk- 
ish fort  on  the  rock  immediately  above  ;  but  the  whole  glen,  with  its 
beetling  sides,  its  rushing  river,  and  its  cavernous  vaultmg,  seems  the 
very  home  and  preserve  of  superstition.'' — [Mahaffy  :  "Rambles  and 
Studies  in  Greece  " ;  London  ed.,  1878:  p.  238. 

XLII. :  p.  128. — "The  Supreme  Being,  Brahma,  is  a  cold  Imper- 
sonality, out  of  relation  with  the  world,  unconscious  of  His  own  exist- 
ence, and  of  ours,  and  devoid  of  all  attributes  and  qualities.  The  so- 
called  personal  God,  the  first  manifestation  of  the  Impersonal,  turns 
out  on  examination  to  be  a  myth ;  there  is  no  God  apart  from  ourselves, 
no  Creator,  no  Holy  Being,  no  Father,  no  Judge — no  one,  in  a  word, 
to  adore,  to  love,  or  to  fear.  And  as  for  ourselves,  we  are  only  unreal 
actors,  on  the  semblance  of  a  stage.  The  goal  already  referred  to,  ia 
worthy  of  such  a  creed,  being  no  less  than  the  complete  extinction  of 
all  spiritual,  mental,  and  bodily  powers,  by  absorption  into  the  Imper- 
sonal."— [Jacob:  "A  Manual  of  Hindu  Pantheism.  The  Ved^ta- 
s^ra";  Boston  ed.,  1881:  p.  123. 

"  It  can  scarcely  be  understood  how  the  followers  of  an  atheistical 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IV.  457 

creed  can  make,  consistently  with  their  opinions,  an  attempt  at  prayer 
Such  an  act  of  devotion  implies  the  belief  in  a  being  superior  to  men, 
who  has  a  controlling  power  over  them,  and  in  whose  hands  their  des- 
tinies are  placed.  .  .  The  Burmese,  in  general,  under  difficult  circum- 
stances, unforeseen  difficulties,  sudden  calamities,  use  always  the  cry, 
Phra  kaiba — God  assist  me — to  obtain  from  above  assistance  and  pro- 
tection. .  .  Whence  that  involuntary  cry  for  assistance,  but  from  the 
innate  consciousness  that  above  man  there  is  some  one  ruling  over  his 
destinies  ?  An  atheistical  system  may  be  elaborated  in  a  school  of 
metaphysics,  and  forced  upon  ignorant  and  unreflecting  masses,  but 
practice  will  ever  belie  theory." — [Bp.  Bigandet:  *'  The  Life  or  Legend 
of  Gaudama";  London  ed.,  1880:  Vol.  1. :  pp.  78-9  (note). 

XLIII. :  p.  128. — "Kumirila  always  speaks  of  Buddha  as  a  Ksha- 
triya  who  tried  to  become  a  Brahman.  For  instance:  'And  this  very 
transgression  of  Buddha  and  his  followers  is  represented  as  if  it  did 
him  honour.  For  he  is  praised  because  he  said,  '  Let  all  the  sins  that 
have  been  committed  in  this  world  fall  on  me,  that  the  world  may  be 
delivered. '  It  is  said  that  if  he  thus  transgressed  the  duty  of  a  Ksha- 
triya,  and  entered  the  life  of  a  Brahman  and  preached,  it  was  merely 
for  the  good  of  mankind  ;  and  that  in  adopting  for  the  instruction  of 
excluded  people  a  law  which  had  not  been  taught  by  the  Bra h mans, 
he  took  the  sin  upon  himself  and  was  benefiting  others.'" — [Mtiller: 
"History  of  Sanskrit  Literature";  London  ed.,  1859:  pp.  79-80  (note). 

XLIV. :  p.  131. — "  But  among  us  you  will  find  uneducated  persons, 
and  artisans,  and  old  women,  who,  if  they  are  unable  in  words  to 
prove  the  benefit  of  our  doctrine,  yet  by  their  deeds  exhibit  the  benefit 
arising  from  their  persuasion  of  its  truth  ;  they  do  not  rehearse 
speeches,  but  exhibit  good  works. " — [Athenagoras  :  * '  Plea  for  Chris- 
tians": XI. 

"  The  following  are  the  rules  laid  down  by  them  [Christians]  :  '  Let 
no  one  come  to  us  who  has  been  instructed,  or  who  is  wise  or  prudent, 
for  such  qualifications  are  deemed  evil  by  us  ;  but  if  there  be  any  ig- 
norant, or  unintelligent,  or  uninstructed,  or  foolish  pei'sons,  let  them 
come  with  confidence.'  By  which  words,  acknowledging  that  such 
individuals  are  worthy  of  their  God,  they  manifestly  show  that  they 
desire  and  are  able  to  gain  over  only  the  silly,  and  the  mean,  and  the 
stupid,with  women  and  children." — [Celsus:  quoted  by  Origen:  III.:  44. 

"Not  only  do  the  rich  among  us  pursue  our  philosophy,  but  the 
poor  enjoy  instruction  gratuitously;  for  the  things  which  come  from 
God  surpass  the  requital  of  worldly  gifts.  Thus  we  admit  all  who  de- 
sire to  hear,  even  old  women  and  striplings ;  and,  in  short,  persons  ol 


458  APPENDIX. 

every  age  are  treated  by  us  with  respect,  but  every  kind  of  licentious- 
ness is  kept  at  a  distance." — [Tatian:  "Address  to  the  Greeks":  xxxii 

XLV. :  p.  131. — "  Thus  do  we  render  thanks  to  Thee,  according  to 
our  feeble  power,  our  God  and  Saviour,  Christ ;  supreme  Providence 
of  the  mighty  Father,  who  both  savest  us  from  evil,  and  impartest  to 
us  Thy  most  blessed  doctrine  :  thus  we  essay,  not  indeed  to  celebrate 
Thy  praise,  but  to  speak  the  language  of  thanksgiving.  For  what 
mortal  is  he  who  shall  worthily  declare  Thy  praise,  of  Whom  we  learn 
that  Thou  didst  from  nothing  call  creation  into  being,  and  illumine  it 
vritL  Thy  light :  that  Thou  didst  regulate  the  confusion  of  the  ele- 
ments, by  the  laws  of  harmony  and  order  !  But  chiefly  we  mark  Thy 
loving-kindness,  in  that  Thou  hast  caused  those  whose  hearts  inclined 
to  Thee,  to  desire  earnestly  a  divine  and  blessed  life ;  and  hast  provided 
that,  like  merchants  of  true  blessings,  they  might  impart  to  many 
others  the  wisdom  and  happiness  which  they  had  received — them- 
selves, meanwhile,  reaping  the  everlasting  fruit  of  virtue." — [Con- 
stantine  :  Orat.  to  Assembly:  xi. :  (Eusebius'  Life  ;  pp.  258-9.) 

"Hence  it  [the  martyr's  death]  is  followed  by  hymns  and  psalms, 
and  songs  of  praise  to  the  all-seeing  God;  and  a  sacrifice  of  thanksgiv- 
ing is  offered  in  memory  of  such  men,  a  bloodless,  a  harmless  sacrifice, . 
\7herein  is  no  need  of  the  fragrant  frankincense,  no  need  of  fire  ;  but- 
only  enough  of  pure  light  [of  tapers]  to  sufiice  the  assembled  woi'ship- 
pers."— [p.  262.] 

XLVI.  :  p.  131.— "This  rugged  but  fine  old  hymn,  of  which  the 
author  is  not  known,  is  probably  of  date  as  early  as  the  eighth  or 
ninth  century;  such  is  Mohnike's  conclusion.  I  have  alluded  already 
to  the  manner  in  which  these  grand  old  compositions  were  recast  in : 
the  Romish  Church  at  the  revival  of  learning,  which  was,  in  Italy  at 
least,  to  so  great  an  extent  a  revival  of  Paganism.  This  is  one  of  the 
few  which  have  not  utterly  perished  in  the  process,  in  which  some 
beauty  has  survived  the  transformation." — [Trench:  "Sacred  Latins 
Poetry";  London  ed.,  1849  :  p.  291. 


NOTES  TO  LECTUEE  V. 

Note  I. :  page  138.— "Table  IV. :  Prov.  1;  as  to  the  immediato  de- 
struction of  monstrous  or  deformed  offspring". — Prov.  11;  relating  to 
the  control  of  the  father  over  his  children,  the  right  existing  during 
their  whole  life  to  imprison,  scourge,  keep  to  rustic  labor  in  chains,  to 
sell  or  slay,  even  though  they  may  be  in  the  enjoyment  of  high  state 
offices." — [Ortolan:  "Hist,  of  Eoman  Law";  Prichard  and  Nasmith's 
ed.,  1871 :  pp.  106-7. 

The  first  of  these  Provisions  is  referred  to  by  Cicero,  De  Leg. :  III. :  8. 

Dionysius,  "Archaeologia,"  2,  2Q,  27,  is  an  authority  for  the  nature 
and  place  of  the  second  Provision. 

"The  House  Father  had  the  jus  vitce  necisque — the  power  of  life  and 
death  over  his  children.  He  could  remove  them  from  the  family, 
either  without  further  provision,  or  by  way  of  sale.  In  matters  of 
property,  whatever  the  son  acquired  was  held  for  his  father's  use.  If 
a  legacy  were  left  to  him,  the  father  received  it.  If  he  made  a  con- 
tract, the  benefit  of  that  contract,  but  not  its  burthen,  enured  to  the 
father.  The  son  was  bound  to  marry  at  the  father's  connnand,  but  his 
wife  and  children  were  not  in  his  own  Hand.  They,  like  himself, 
were  subject  to  the  aU-pervading  rule  of  the  father.  .  .  In  a  word, 
the  son  had  no  remedy,  either  civil  or  criminal,  against  his  father,  for 
any  act,  forbearance,  or  omission,  of  any  kind  whatever." — [W.  E. 
Heam:   "Aryan  Household " ;  London  ed.,  1879  :  pp.  91-2. 

The  statement  of  Coulanges  is  unquestionably  correct : — "The  law 
that  permitted  a  father  to  sell  or  even  to  kill  his  son — a  law  that  we 
find  both  in  Greece  and  in  Rome — was  not  established  by  a  city.  .  . 
Private  law  existed  before  the  city.  When  the  city  began  to  write  its 
laws,  it  found  this  law  already  established,  living,  rooted  in  the  cus-. 
toms,  strong  by  universal  observance." — ["The  Ancient  City";  New 
York  ed.,  1874  :  p.  111. 

II.:  p.  139. — "He  [Claudius]  next  married  Plantia  Urgulanilla, 
whose  father  had  had  the  honor  of  a  triumph,  and  ^lia  Paetina, 
whose  father  was  of  consular  rank.  He  divorced  each ;  Urgulanilla, 
on  account  of  the  infamies  of  her  lewdness,  and  the  suspicion  of  mui: 

(459) 


460  APPENDIX. 

■der.  .  .  Claudia,  really  the  daughter  of  Boter,  his  own  freedmaa,  al 
though  born  five  months  before  his  divorce,  he  commanded  to  be  ex 
posed,  and  to  be  thrown  naked  at  her  mother's  threshold." — [Suetonius: 
"Claudius":  xxvi.,  xxvii. 

Minucius  Felix  refers  to  the  exposure  of  children  to  wild  beasts  and 
birds,  and  the  practice  of  crushing  them  by  strangling  into  a  miserable 
kind  of  death,  as  continuing  in  his  day. — ["  Octavius":  xxx. 

III. :  p.  139. — "But  now  the  new-bom  infant  is  committed  to  some 
Greek  chambermaid,  to  whom  is  added  one  or  another  taken  from 
among  the  slaves,  very  often  the  vilest  of  all,  and  not  fit  for  any  serious 
office  whatever.  By  the  nonsensical  stories  and  deceptions  of  these 
people,  the  tender  and  uninstructed  minds  are  directly  imbued;  nor 
does  any  one  in  all  the  house  have  the  least  thought  of  what  he  may 
say  or  do  in  the  presence  of  the  young  master ;  while  even  the  parents 
themselves  accustom  their  little  ones  neither  to  probity  nor  to  modesty, 
but  to  licentiousness  and  contemptuous  talk."  —  [Tacitus:  Orator. 
Dial.:  xxix. 

IV.  :  p.  139. — "Let  then  these  follies,  which  are  hardly  less  than 
old-womanish,  be  expelled,  representing  that  it  is  a  miserable  thing  to 
die  before  one's  time.  .  .  These  veiy  persons,  if  a  young  child  dies, 
think  that  this  is  to  be  borne  with  an  undisturbed  mind ;  that  if  indeed 
an  infant  in  the  cradle  dies,  there  is  to  be  no  complaint  whatever.  Yet 
from  such  a  child  nature  has  more  sharply  exacted  the  return  of  what 
she  had  given." — [Cicero:  Tuscul.  Quaest. :  I.:  39. 

V.  :  p.  139. — "  On  the  day  on  which  he  [Augustus]  was  bom,  when 
action  was  being  taken  in  the  Senate  in  regard  to  Catiline's  conspiracy, 
and  when  Octavius,  in  consequence  of  his  wife's  being  in  child-birth, 
came  later  than  usual,  it  is  a  fact  well  known  and  commonly  reported 
that  P.  Nigidius,  hearing  the  occasion  of  his  tardiness,  when  he  had 
learned  the  hour  of  the  delivery,  declared  that  a  master  of  the  world 
had  been  born."— [Suetonius:  "  Octav.  Augustus  " :  XCIV. 

Dion  Cassius  adds  that  he  who  had  made  the  prediction  then  re- 
strained Octavius,  who  was  troubled  at  this,  and  determined  to  destroy 
the  child;  and  that  the  matter  was  one  of  notoriety  at  the  time. — 
[XLV.;  Leipsic  ed.,  1863:  Vol.  2:  p.  169. 

Possibly  both  spoke  in  jest;  but  the  power  of  doing  what  Octavius 
threatened  is  implied  in  the  jest. 

According  to  Herodotus,  Hippocrates  was  advised  by  Chilon  nerej 
to  marry,  or  if  he  took  a  wife  to  send  her  away,  if  he  had  a  son  to  dis- 
own him.  He  disrfegarded  the  advice,  and  became  the  father  of  Pei 
fii  stratus. — [I. :  59.  . 


W02JES  TO  LECTURE  V,  401 

**  Within  our  own  memory,  tlie  populace  pierced  with  their  sharp 
iron  styles  Erixo,  a  Roman  knight,  in  the  forum,  because  he  had  killed 
his  son  with  whips.  With  difficulty  did  the  authority  of  Augustus 
Caesar  snatch  him  from  the  furious  hands  as  well  of  fathers  as  of  sons." 
— [Seneca ;  De  Clem. :  I. :  14. 

VI.  :  p.  140. — "  For  now,  in  the  first  place,  if  you  had  been  disposed 
to  follow  out  my  command,  it  was  proper  that  she  should  be  dispatched ; 
not  that  you  should  feign  her  death  in  words,  and  in  reality  give  the  hope 
of  her  life.  But  this  I  omit : — compassion,  maternal  affection :  I  allow 
it.  But  how  well  was  her  future  provided  for  by  you !  What  did  you 
wish  ?  Think.  Most  clearly  your  daughter  was  delivered  by  you  to 
this  old  woman ;  either  that  through  you  she  might  get  gain,  or  that 
the  child  might  openly  be  sold."— [Terence:  Heaut. :  IV. :  1:  634-640. 

See  also  Apuleius:  "Golden  Ass":  X.  (Ep.  14). 

VII.  :  p.  140. — "Nor  was  it  in  the  power  of  the  father  to  dispose  of 
the  child  as  he  thought  fit :  he  was  obliged  to  carry  it  before  certain  Try- 
ers,  at  a  place  called  Lesche ;  there  were  some  of  the  elders  of  the  tribe 
to  which  the  child  belonged ;  their  business  it  was  to  carefully  view 
the  ^ant,  and  if  they  found  it  stout  and  well-made,  they  gave  order 
for  its  rearing ;  .  .  but  if  they  found  it  puny  and  ill-shaped,  they 
ordered  it  to  be  taken  to  what  was  called  the  Apothetae,  a  sort  of  chasm 
under  Taygetus ;  as  thinking  it  neither  for  the  good  of  the  child  itself, 
nor  for  the  public  interest,  that  it  should  be  brought  up,  if  it  did  not 
from  the  outset  appear  to  be  made  to  be  healthy  and  vigorous.  .  .  I 
myself  have  seen  several  of  the  youths  endure  whipping  to  death  at 
the  foot  of  the  altar  of  Diana,  surnamed  Orthia." — [Plutarch :  "Lives " ; 
Boston  ed.,  1859:  Vol.  1:  pp.  105,  108. 

VIII.  :  p.  140. — "  The  proper  officers  will  take  the  offspring  of  the 
good  parents  to  the  pen  or  fold,  and  there  they  will  deposit  them  with 
certain  nurses  who  dwell  in  a  separate  quarter;  but  the  offspring  of 
the  inferior,  or  of  the  better  when  they  chance  to  be  deformed,  they 
will  conceal  in  some  mysterious,  unknown  place.  Decency  will  be 
respected."— [Plato:  "Republic":  v.:  460. 

' '  With  respect  to  the  exposing  or  bringing  up  of  children,  let  it  be  a  law 
that  nothing  imperfect  or  maimed  shall  be  brought  up ;  but,  to  avoid 
an  excess  of  population,  let  some  law  be  laid  down,  if  it  be  not  per- 
mitted by  the  habits  and  customs  of  the  people,  that  any  of  the  chil- 
dren born  shall  be  exposed ;  for  a  limit  must  be  fixed  to  the  population 
of  the  state.  But  if  any  parents  have  more  children  than  the  number 
prescribed,  before  life  and  sensation  begin  an  abortion  must  be  brought 
about."— [Aristotle:  "Politics":  vii. :  16. 


462  APPENDIX. 

It  will  be  remembered  by  those  who  have  read  Becker's  '*  Cliaricles  "^ 
that  the  discovery  in  manhood  of  a  son  who  had  been  abandoned  in 
infancy,  is  the  fact  by  which  that  interesting  and  instructive  portrait 
of  Greek  manners  is  brought  to  its  climax : — 

** '  By  Olympian  Zeus'!  shouted  Sophilos,  '  that  man  has  found  it  ; 
and  I  am  he.  With  this  very  ring  I  had  my  third  child  exposed,  be- 
cause, fool  that  I  was,  two  male  heirs  seemed  quite  enough  to  me  at 
that  time.  One-and-twenty  years  have  rolled  by  since  then;  that  is 
thine  age,  and  thou  art  my  son'!  '— [*' Charicles;  or  Private  Life  of 
Ancient  Greeks  " ;  London  ed.,  1866:  p.  201. 

The  plan  of  Plato  to  regulate  the  plays  of  children  by  the  state,  has 
been  illustrated  in  an  extract  from  the  "  Laws  "  (vii.  :  797)  in  a  pre- 
vious note. — [Lect.  III. :  note  XVII. 

IX. :  p.  140. — "  We  destroy  rabid  dogs,  we  kill  a  fierce  and  unman 
ageable  ox,  and  on  sick  sheep  we  let  drive  the  iron,  lest  they  should 
infect  the  flock  ;  we  deprive  of  life  unnatural  offspring  ;  likewise  we 
drown  children  if  they  are  born  disabled  and  monstrous.  It  is  not 
wrath,  but  reason,  so  to  separate  things  useless  from  those  that  are 
sound." — [Seneca  :  De  Ira  :  I. :  15. 

''  Dost  thou  wish  to  know  how  slight  a  benefit  it  may  be  thus  to^ve 
life  to  a  child  ?  If  thou  hadst  exposed  me  [implying  that  this  was  at 
the  option  of  the  father],  certainly  it  would  have  been  an  injury  to 
have  begotten  me." — [De  Benef. :  HI. :  31. 

Even  Socrates,  it  is  to  be  noticed,  speaks  carelessly,  almost  sneeringly, 
of  the  anguish  of  young  mothers  when  their  first  children  were  taken 
from  them. — [Theatetus  :  151. 

X. :  p.  141. — "The  mere  tie  of  blood-relationship  was  of  no  account 
among  the  Romans.  They  used  the  words  parens,  parentes,  in  the 
strict  sense  of  'begetting,'  and  not  as  the  English,  who  apply  the  term 
both  to  father  and  mother,  nor  as  the  French,  who  include  in  it  the 
whole  [body  of]  relations.  .  .  The  tie  of  family  was  not  the  tie  of  blood ; 
it  was  not  the  tie  produced  by  marriage  and  by  generation,  but  a  bond 
created  by  civil  law — a  bond  of  power.  .  .  This  idea  of  power  as  the 
basis  of  the  Roman  family  must  be  taken  in  its  most  absolute,  most 
despotic  sense.  A  single  individual,  the  head,  was  the  master,  the  pro 
prietor  of  all  the  others,  of  all  the  patrimony  ;  body  and  estate,  all 
were  his.  As  for  himself,  he  was  independent." — [Ortolan:  "Hist,  of 
Roman  Law";  Prichard  and  Nasmith's  ed.,  1871:  pp.  129,  57&-79. 

"By  the  eldest,  at  the  moment  of  his  birth,  the  father,  havLag  begot- 
ten  a  son,  discharges  his  debt  to  his  own  progenitors  :  the  eldest  son, 
therefore,  ought  before  partition  to  manage  the  whole  patrimony. 
Tliat  son  alone,  by  whose  birth  he  discharges  his  debt,  and  through 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  4,63 

Avhoin  he  attains  immortality,  was  begotten  from  a  sense  of  duty  :  the 
rest  are  considered  by  the  wise  as  begotten  from  love  of  pleasure." — 
[Laws  of  Menu;  ix. :  106,  107;  Sir  W.  Jones' Works:  London  ed., 
1807:  Vol.  8:  pp.  18,  19. 

XI. :  p.  141. — "  The  greatest  reverence  is  due  to  a  boy  :  if  you  are 
makmg  ready  for  anything  base,  do  not  despise  the  years  of  the  child, 
but  let  your  infant  son  stand  in  the  way  of  the  sin  about  to  be  com- 
mitted. .  .  It  is  a  matter  for  gratitude  that  you  have  given  a  citizen  to 
your  country  and  people,  if  you  bring  it  to  pass  that  he  shall  be  fit  for 
service  to  the  state,  useful  to  her  lands,  useful  in  the  transaction  of  af- 
fairs both  of  war  and  of  peace.  For  it  will  be  a  matter  of  the  greatest 
concern  in  what  pursuits  and  in  what  moral  habits  you  shall  instruct 
him."— [Juvenal:  Sat.  xiv. :  47-49,  70-74. 

XII. :  p.  142. — "  The  question  which  relates  to  the  children  who  were 
bom  free,  and  then  exposed,  and  who,  being  afterward  supported 
by  others,  have  been  trained  in  slavery,  has  often  been  discussed  ;  but 
nothing  is  found  in  the  constitutions  of  the  princes  who  preceded  me 
which  has  been  ordained  for  all  the  provinces.  .  .  I  am  therefore  of 
opinion  that  the  claim  of  those  is  not  to  be  denied  who  legally  demand 
their  liberty  upon  this  basis  :  nor  is  that  liberty  to  be  re-purchased  by 
paying  the  cost  of  what  has  been  expended  for  their  maintenance." — 
[Trajan  to  Pliny  :  Epist.  x. :  72. 

This  humane  decision,  however,  was  found  to  operate  cruelly,  in  dis- 
couraging the  preservation  of  abandoned  children  by  those  who  found 
them,  and  so  it  was  not  maintained  by  later  emperors. 

"  Indeed  I  find  nothing  more  suitable  to  the  purpose  [of  aiding  the 
poor]  than  that  which  I  have  myself  done.  For  five  hundred  thousand 
sesterces  [$20,000],  which  I  proposed  for  aid  in  the  maintenance  of  free- 
born  children,  I  made  sale  of  an  estate  of  mine,  worth  much  more,  to 
the  public  agent :  the  same  estate  I  received  back  from  him,  with  a 
rent-charge  imposed  of  thirty  thousand  sesterces  ($1,200),  to  be  an- 
nually paid.  In  this  way  the  principal  sum  was  safely  secured  to  the 
state,  nor  was  the  revenue  left  uncertain ;  and  the  estate,  which  far  sur- 
passes in  value  the  rent-charge,  will  always  find  a  master  by  whom  it 
shall  be  carried  on. "—[Pliny;  Ep.  vil. :  18. 

XIII, :  p.  142. — "  Over  the  person  of  the  child  the  father  had  origi- 
nally a  power  of  life  and  death.  So  the  Lex  Pompeia  de  paricidiis^ 
enumerating  the  persons  who  could  be  guilty  of  parricide,  or  the  murder 
of  a  blood  relation,  omits  the  father.  But  in  later  times  this  power  was 
withdrawn.  Hadrian  condemned  to  deportation  a  father  who  in  the 
hunting-field  killed  his  son  who  had  committed  adultery  vdth  his  step* 


464  APPENDIX. 

mother.  Constantine,  a.d.  319,  included  killing  by  a  fathei  under  the 
ci'ime  of  parricide.  Fathers  retained  the  power  of  moderate  chastise- 
ment, but  severe  punishment  could  only  be  inflicted  by  the  magistrate, 
.  .  It  was  originally  at  the  option  of  the  parent  whether  he  would 
rear  an  infant  or  expose  it  to  perish ;  but  in  later  times  exposition  waa 
unlawful:  (a.d.  374)."— [Poste:  Comm.  on  Gains'  Instit. ;  Oxford  ed., 
1875:  p.  65. 

XIV. :  p.  145. — "  Thou  shalt  not  slay  the  child  by  procuring  abor- 
tion :  nor,  again,  shalt  thou  destroy  it  after  it  is  born.  Thou  shalt  not 
withdraw  thy  hand  from  thy  son,  or  from  thy  daughter,  but  from 
their  infancy  thou  shalt  teach  them  the  fear  of  the  Lord.  .  .  Thou 
shalt  not  issue  ordei^  with  bitterness  to  thy  maid-servant  or  thy  man- 
servant, who  trust  in  the  same  God,  lest  thou  shouldst  not  reverence 
that  God  who  is  above  both." — [Ep.  of  Barnabas:  xix. 

"But  as  for  us  [Christians],  we  have  been  taught  that  to  expose 
newly-born  children  is  the  part  of  wicked  men  ;  and  this  we  have  been 
taught  lest  we  should  do  any  one  an  injury,  and  lest  we  should  sin 
against  God  ;  first,  because  we  see  that  almost  all  so  exposed— not 
only  the  girls,  but  also  the  males— are  brought  up  to  prostitution ;  .  . 
and  again  [we  fear  to  expose  children],  lest  some  of  them  be  not  picked 
up  but  die,  and  we  become  murderers." — [Justin  IVIartyr;  Apol.  I.: 
27,  29. 

"  Therefore  let  no  one  imagine  that  this  is  allowed,  to  strangle  new- 
born children,  which  is  the  greatest  impiety  :  for  God  breathes  into 
their  souls  for  life,  and  not  for  death.  .  .  Can  they  be  considered  inno- 
cent who  expose  their  offspring  as  a  prey  to  dogs,  and,  as  far  as  it  de- 
pends on  themselves,  kill  them  in  a  more  cruel  manner  than  if  they 
had  strangled  them  ?  Who  can  doubt  that  he  is  impious  who  gives 
occasion  for  the  pity  of  others  [to  save  his  exposed  child]  ?  For  al- 
though that  which  he  has  wished  should  befall  the  child — namely, 
that  it  should  be  brought  up — he  has  certainly  consigned  his  own  off- 
spring either  to  servitude  or  to  the  brothel.  .  .  It  is  therefore  as  wicked 
to  expose  as  it  is  to  kill." — [Lactantius:  Div.  Inst. :  vi. :  20. 

XV.  :  p.  145. — The  words  of  Irenaeus  show  how  affectionately  a 
relation  of  the  IMaster's  mission  to  infants  was  recognized  in  the  second 
century,  when  he  speaks  of  the  Lord  as  "sanctifying  every  age  by 
that  period  corresponding  to  it  which  belonged  to  Himself.  For  He 
came  to  save  all  through  means  of  Himself — all,  I  say,  who  through 
Him  are  born  again  to  God — infants,  and  children,  and  boys,  and 
young  men,  and  old  men.  He  therefore  passed  through  every  age, 
becoming  an  infant  for  infants,  thus  sanctifying  infants  :  a  child  for 
childi'en,  thus  sanctifying  those  of  this  age,  being  at  the  same  time 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  F.  465 

made  to  them  an  example  of  piety,  righteousness,  and  submission : 
etc."— ["Agamst  Heresies":  II.:  22:  §4. 

Tertullian's  energetic  declaration  in  favor  of  deferring  the  baptism 
of  infants  shows  how  common  in  his  time  was  the  opposite  practice : — 
"According  to  the  circumstances,  and  disposition,  and  even  the  age, 
of  each  individual,  the  delay  of  baptism  is  preferable  ;  principally, 
however,  in  the  case  of  little  cliildren.  For  why  is  it  necessary  .  . 
that  the  sponsors  likewise  should  be  thrust  into  danger  ?  who  both 
themselves,  by  reason  of  mortality,  may  fail  to  fulfill  their  promises, 
and  may  be  disappointed  by  the  development  of  an  evil  disposition  [in 
the  young  child  for  whom  they  stand].  The  Lord  doth  indeed  say, 
' Forbid  them  not  to  come  unto  me.'  Let  them  come  then,  while  they 
are  growing  up ;  .  let  them  become  Christians  [in  baptism]  when  they 
have  become  able  to  know  Christ.  Why  should  the  innocent  period 
of  life  hasten  to  '  the  remission  of  sins '  ? " — [On  Baptism :  xviii. 

Origen,  as  is  well  known,  treated  Infant  Baptism  as  "an  apostolical 
tradition";  and  Cyprian,  with  the  consent  of  many  Bishops,  in  the 
middle  of  the  third  century,  would  have  as  little  time  as  possible  inter- 
vene between  the  birth  and  the  baptism. — [Ep.  LViii:  (To  Fidus). 

Justin  Martyi\  in  his  first  Apology  (ch.  15),  speaks  of  "  many,  both 
men  and  women,  who  have  been  Christ's  disciples  from  childhood, 
and  who  remain  pure  at  the  age  of  sixty  or  seventy  years,"  and  adds 
that  he  could  "  produce  such  from  every  race  of  men."  This  shows  at 
least  the  early  recognition  of  young  children  in  the  household  of  be^ 
lievers. 

XVI.:  p,  145. — "After  this  [the  Hosanna]  let  the  bishop  partake, 
then  the  presbyters,  and  deacons,  and  sub-deacons,  and  the  readers, 
and  the  singers,  and  the  ascetics ;  then,  of  the  women,  the  deaconesses, 
and  the  virgins,  and  the  widows;  then  the  children;  and  then  all  the 
people  m  order,  etc."— ["  Apostohc  Constitutions":  viii. :  13:  (Third 
Cent.) 

"  When,  however,  the  solemnities  were  finished  [of  prayer  and  sup- 
phcation]  and  the  deacon  began  to  offer  the  cup  to  those  present,  and 
when,  as  the  rest  received  it,  its  turn  approached,  the  little  child  [hav- 
ing been  previously  forced  by  the  magistrates  to  partake  of  an  idola- 
trous sacrifice],  by  the  instinct  of  the  divine  majesty,  turned  away  its 
face,  compressed  its  mouth  with  resisting  lips,  and  refused  the  cup. 
StiU  the  deacon  persisted,  and,  although  against  her  efforts,  forced  on 
her  some  of  the  sacrament  of  the  cup.  "—[Cyprian  :  "  On  the  Lapsed  '• : 

XXV. 

"  The  Oriental  Churches,  in  conformity  with  ancient  usage,  still  ad- 
minister the  Eucharist  to  infants.     In  the  Coptic  Church  it  may  even 
happen  that  an  infant  is  the  only  recipient.     The  Latin  Church,  on  the 
30 


^66  APPENDIX. 

other  hand,  in  deference  to  modem  feeling,  has  not  only  abandoned 
but  actually  forbidden  a  practice  which,  as  far  as  antiquity  is  con* 
cerned,  might  insist  on  unconditional  retention." — [Stanley:  " Eastern 
Church";  New  York  ed.,  1862:  p.  119. 

"If  any  one  saith,  that  the  conununion  of  the  Eucharist  is  necessary 
for  little  children,  before  they  have  arrived  at  years  of  discretion :  let 
him  be  Anathema." — [Council  of  Trent:  Sess.  xxi. :  chap.  rv. :  can.  4. 

XVn. :  p.  147. — The  early  Oriental  feeling  concerning  woman  may 
seem  still  to  find  expression  in  the  Jewish  worship  of  our  day.  In  the 
morning  service  for  the  Jewish  Sabbath,  among  other  ascriptions  ol 
praise  to  God,  are  these: 

"Blessed  art  thou,  O  Lord  our  God,  King  of  the  Universe!  who  hath 
not  made  me  a  Heathen. 

"Blessed  art  thou,  O  Lord  our  God,  King  of  the  Universe! who  hath 
not  made  me  a  Slave. 

"Blessed  art  thou,  0  Lord  our  God,  King  of  the  Universe! who  hath 
not  made  me  a  Woman. 

"  The  women  say  :  Blessed  art  thou,  O  Lord  our  God,  King  of  the 
Universe!  who  hath  made  me  according  to  His  will." 

In  "  The  Ethics,"  contained  also  in  the  Hebrew  Prayer-Book,  it  is 
related  that  "  Jose  Ben  Jochanau,  of  Jerusalem,  said,  let  thy  house  be 
wide  open :  and  let  the  poor  be  thy  domestic  servants,  and  be  not  prone 
to  much  discourse  with  woman-kind  :  not  even  with  thy  wife,  much 
less  with  thy  neighbor's  wife  :  hence  the  wise  men  say,  whoever  con- 
verses much  with  women,  bringeth  evil  on  himself,  and  thus  neglects 
the  study  of  the  law,  and  at  last  will  inherit  hell." — ["  Prayers  of  Is- 
rael"; New  York  ed.  (11th),  1870:  p.  11;  "Ethics":  chap.  1:  pp.  3,  5. 

Prof.  MuiTay  says,  however,  in  speaking  of  the  Temple-worship  at 
Jerusalem : — 

"This  regular  choir  was  made  up  both  of  bass  and  soprano  voices. 
The  soprano  parts  were  carried  by  female  singers — this  once  disputed 
question  is  now  very  clear  to  all  scholars.  Here,  as  so  often  elsewhere, 
the  Jewish  orthodoxy  of  modem  times,  in  allowing  no  female  singers 
in  the  Synagogue,  represents  not  a  knowledge  but  an  ignorance  of  the 
past.  In  fact,  I  believe  that  all  the  restrictive  regulations  of  the  ser- 
vice and  the  worship,  as  the  Court  of  the  Women,  and  many  distinc- 
tions inimical  to  them,  are  the  outgrowth  of  later  times  and  foreign 
influence."— [T.  C.  Murray:  "Lects.  on  Psalms";  New  York  ed., 
1880:  pp.  307-8. 

This  seems  confirmed  by  the  instruction  of  the  Talmud  : — 

"Love  your  wife  like  yourself,  honour  her  more  than  yourself. 
Whosoever  lives  unmarried,  lives  without  joy,  without  comfort,  with- 
out blessing.   .   .   He  who  forsakes  the  love  of  his  youth,  God's  alta* 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  467 

weeps  for  him.  He  who  sees  his  wife  die  before  him,  has,  as  it  wei-e, 
been  present  at  the  destruction  of  the  sanctuary  itself — around  him  the 
world  grows  dark.  It  is  woman  alone  through  whom  God's  blessinga 
are  vouchsafed  to  a  house.  She  teaches  the  children,  speeds  the  hus- 
band to  the  place  of  worship  and  instruction,  welcomes  him  when  he 
returns,  keeps  the  house  godly  and  pure,  and  God's  blessings  rest  upon 
all  these  things." — [See  Emanuel  Deutsch  :  "Remains";  New  York 
ed.,  1874:  p.  56. 

X"VIII. :  p.  148. — "  The  last  extreme  of  popular  liberty  is  when  the 
slave  bought  with  money,  whether  male  or  female,  is  just  as  free  aa 
his  or  her  purchaser  ;  nor  must  I  forget  to  speak  of  the  liberty  and 
equahty  of  the  two  sexes  in  relation  to  each  other." — [Plato:  "  Repub- 
lic " :  VIII. :  563. 
Cicero's  commentary  on  Plato's  doctrine  on  this  point  is : — 
"  When  the  insatiate  jaws  of  the  populace  are  parched  in  thirst  for 
liberty,  and  the  people,  instigated  by  evil  ministers,  drains  in  that 
thirst  a  too  untempered  freedom,  .  .  then  it  comes  to  pass  that  the 
father  feai*s  the  son  ;  that  the  son  neglects  the  father  ;  all  modesty  is 
banished,  that  they  all  may  become  manifestly  free.  .  .  From  which 
it  results  that  even  the  slaves  bear  themselves  as  under  slight  restraint; 
that  wives  possess  the  same  legal  privilege  with  their  husbands  ;  in- 
deed, in  a  liberty  so  excessive,  even  dogs,  horses,  and  asses  are  finally 
emancipated,  to  rush  about  at  their  will." — ["  De  Repub.":  I. :  43. 

XIX.:  p.  148. — "  With  respect  to  manners  [in  a  tragedy]  there  are 
four  things  to  which  one  ought  to  direct  attention :  one,  and  the  first, 
that  they  be  good.  .  .  But  manners  are  to  be  found  in  each  genus  ; 
for  both  a  woman  and  a  slave  may  be  good ;  though  perhaps  of  these, 
the  one  is  less  good,  and  the  other  is  wholly  bad."  —  [Aristotle: 
"Poetic":  XV. 

XX. :  p.  148. — "The  law  which  is  the  sequel  of  this,  and  of  all  that 
has  preceded,  is  to  this  effect, — 'that  the  wives  of  these  guardians  are 
to  be  common,  and  their  children  also  common,  and  no  pai^nt  is  to 
know  his  o^vn  child,  nor  any  child  his  parent.' " — [Plato :  "Republic  " ; 
V. :  457. 

"The  proposal  was  that  all  wives  and  children  should  be  in  com- 
mon ;  and  we  devised  means  that  no  one  should  ever  be  able  to  know 
his  own  child,  but  that  all  should  imagine  themselves  to  be  of  one 
family,  and  should  regard  as  brothers  and  sisters  those  who  were 
within  a  certain  limit  of  age ;  and  those  who  were  of  an  elder  genera- 
tion they  were  to  regard  as  parents  and  grandparents,  and  those  who 
were  of  a  younger  generation  as  children  and  grandchildren.   .    .   And 


468  APPENDIX. 

you  remember  how  we  said  that  the  children  of  the  good  parents  were 
to  be  educated,  and  the  children  of  bad  parents  secretly  dispersed 
among  the  other  citizens,  etc." — ["Timaeus":  18,  19. 

XXI. :  p.  148. — "  Nature  had  cried  with  a  voice  almost  audible  to  wo- 
man, '  to  be  respectable,  you  must  be  chaste. '  Athens  had  the  audacity  to 
say,  ^  to  be  prized  and  regarded  among  us,  you  must  be  unchaste.'  .  . 
In  conformity  with  these  views,  the  education  which  was  denied  to  the 
woman  of  character  was  sedulously  bestowed  upon  the  woman  who 
thus  consented  to  purchase  knowledge  at  the  price  of  character.  To 
sing,  to  dance,  to  play  upon  the  lyre,  to  blow  the  single  and  the  double 
flute,  were  accomplishments  in  which  the  hetaera  was,  from  the  ten- 
derest  years,  carefully  instructed ;  and  though  Grecian  mannei's  did  not 
admit  of  her  appearing  upon  the  stage,  the  habits  of  private  life  af- 
forded ample  opportunity  for  the  display  of  these  talents,  and  for  ad- 
vancing the  fortunes  of  the  possessor  of  them.  .  .  The  woman  thus 
trained  and  educated  became  the  companion  of  statesmen,  of  poets  and 
philosophers ;  she  lived  and  conversed  with  those  who  had  the  gift  of 
inunortality  in  their  hands;  and  accordingly,  while  the  modest  but 
unlettered  housewife  sank  into  oblivion,  the  hetaera  became  the  subject 
of  history;  her  birth  was  made  an  object  of  curiosity;  her  fortunes 
were  carefully  traced ;  her  bon-mots  and  sallies  of  wit  were  dihgently 
registered ;  and  after  wearing  a  diadem,  perhaps,  during  her  life,  she 
was  buried  in  a  tomb  which,  from  its  unrivalled  magnificence,  a 
stranger  to  Athenian  customs  was  apt  to  think  dedicated  to  the 
most  perfect  of  her  heroes,  philosophers,  or  statesmen." — [Quarterly 
Review  :  Vol.  22  :  pp.  190-194. 

XXII.:  p.  148.— "The  law  of  Solon  declares  that  all  acts  shall  be 
null  and  void,  which  are  done  by  any  one  under  the  influence  of  a 
woman ;  much  more,  such  a  woman  as  that  [the  mistress  of  Olympio- 
dorus].  Wisely  has  the  legislator  provided." — [Demosthenes  :  Orat. 
adv.  Olymp. :  1183. 

XXni. :  p.  148. — "If,  again,  I  must  say  anything  on  the  subject  of 
woman's  excellence  also,  with  reference  to  those  of  you  who  will  now 
be  in  widowhood,  I  will  express  it  all  in  a  brief  exhortation :  Great  will 
be  your  glory  in  not  falling  short  of  the  natural  character  that  belongs 
to  you  ;  and  great  is  hers  who  is  least  talked  of  among  the  men, 
whether  for  good  or  evil." — [Pericles'  Funeral  Oration:  Thucydides  : 
II. :  45.  According  to  Plato,  this  celebrated  oration  was  composed  by 
Aspasia.     "Menexenus":  236. 

XXIV. :  p.  148. — "  By  a  girl,  or  by  a  young  woman,  or  by  a  woman. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V,  469 

advanced  in  years,  nothing  must  be  done,  even  in  her  own  dwelling 
place,  according  to  her  mere  pleasure. 

"In  childhood  must  a  female  be  dependent  on  her  father;  in  youth, 
on  her  husband ;  her  lord  being  dead,  on  her  sons ;  if  she  have  no  sons, 
on  the  near  kinsmen  of  her  husband ;  if  he  left  no  kinsmen,  on  those 
of  her  father;  if  she  have  no  paternal  kinsmen,  on  the  sovereign.  A 
woman  must  never  seek  independence." — [Laws  of  Menu  :  chap.  v. : 
147-8.    Works  of  Sir  Wilham  Jones ;  London  ed. ,  1807 :  Vol.  7 :  p.  269. 

"Without  exception,  they  [certain  native  street-songs  in  India]  de- 
clared that  life  in  India  had  become  intolerable  since  the  English  crimi- 
nal laws  had  begun  to  treat  women  and  children  as  if  they  were  men." — 
[Sir  H.  S.  Maine  :  "Village  Communities";  London  ed.,  1871 :  pp. 
115-16. 

"We  are  told  by  the  same  author  [Megasthenes]  that  the  Indians  did 
not  communicate  their  metaphysical  doctrines  to  women  ;  thinking 
that  if  their  wives  understood  these  doctrines,  and  learned  to  be  indif- 
ferent to  pleasure  and  pain,  and  to  consider  life  and  death  as  the  same, 
they  would  no  longer  continue  to  be  the  slaves  of  others ;  or,  if  they 
failed  to  understand  them,  they  would  be  talkative,  and  communicate 
their  knowledge  to  those  who  had  no  right  to  it.  This  statement  of  the 
Greek  author  is  fully  borne  out  by  the  later  Sanskrit  authorities." — 
[Max  MiiUer  :  "  History  of  Ancient  Sanskrit  Literature  " ;  London  ed., 
1859  :  p.  27. 

XXV.  :  p.  149.—"  Man,"  said  he  [Confucius],  "  is  the  representative 
of  Heaven,  and  is  supreme  over  all  things.  Woman  yields  obedience 
to  the  instructions  of  man,  and  helps  to  carry  out  his  principles.  On 
this  account  she  can  determine  nothing  of  herself,  and  is  subject  to  the 
rule  of  the  three  obediences.  When  young,  she  must  obey  her  father 
and  elder  brother ;  when  married,  she  must  obey  her  husband ;  when 
her  husband  is  dead,  she  must  obey  her  son.  .  .  Woman's  business  is 
simply  the  preparation  and  supplying  of  wine  and  food.  Beyond  the 
threshold  of  her  apartments  she  should  not  be  known,  for  evil  or  for 
good.  .  .  She  may  take  no  step  on  her  own  motion,  and  may  come  to 
no  conclusion  on  her  own  dehberation." — [Legge :  "  Chinese  Classics  " : 
Proleg. :  Ch.  V. :  Sect.  11:  §  7. 

After  noticing  the  combination  of  two  characters  in  the  Chinese 
language  to  denote  happiness,  and  inferring  that  '  the  Chinese  notion 
of  happiness  is  simply  represented  by  a  mouth,  filled  with  good  rice,' 
Schlegel  adds :  ' '  Another  example  of  nearly  the  same  kind  is  giv  en  by 
Eemusat,  with  something  of  shyness  and  reserve : — the  character  desig- 
nating woman,  when  doubled,  signifies  strife  and  contention,  and  when 
tripled,  immoral  and  disorderly  conduct." — [Frederick  Schlegel:  "  Phi- 
losophy of  History  ";  New  York  ed.,  1841:  Vol.  1:  p.  164. 


^^ 


470  APPENDIX. 

XXVI.  :  p.  149. — "  Even  a  man  like  Metellus  Macedonicus  [Gibbon 
Bays  Numidicus],  who,  for  bis  honorable  domestic  life  and  his  nu- 
merous host  of  children,  was  the  admiration  of  his  contemporaries, 
when  Censor  in  623  [a.u.c]  enforced  the  obligation  of  the  burgesses  to 
live  in  a  state  of  matrimony,  by  describing  it  as  an  oppressive  public 
burden,  which  patriots  ought  nevertheless  to  undertake  from  a  sense  of 
duty.  *If  we  could,'  he  said,  'we  should  indeed  keep  clear  of  tliis 
burden.  But  as  nature  has  so  arranged  it  that  we  cannot  either  liv»"» 
comfortably  with  wives,  or  live  at  all  without  them,  it  is  proper  tc 
have  regard  rather  to  the  permanent  weal  than  to  our  brief  comfort.' 
.  .  Cato,  the  censor,  had  in  like  manner  declared  that  '  all  women 
were  plaguey  and  proud,'  and  that  '  if  men  were  quit  of  women  they 
would  probably  be  less  godless.'" — [Mom m sen:  "Hist,  of  Rome"; 
New  York  ed. :  Vol.  3:  p.  503;  2:  p.  481. 

He  [Cato]  had  expelled  from  the  Senate  Manilius,  who  had  expecta- 
tion of  the  consulship,  because  he  had  kissed  his  wife  in  the  daytime, 
and  in  the  presence  of  his  daughter. — [See  Plutarch:  "  Lives  ";  Boston 
ed.,  1859:  Vol.  2:  p.  338. 

XXVII.  :  p.  149. — "According  to  our  ancestors,  even  women  who 
have  attained  their  majority,  on  account  of  theii'  levity  of  mind,  re- 
quire to  be  kept  in  tutelage.  Accordingly,  when  a  brother  and  a  sis- 
ter have  a  testamentary  guardian,  on  reaching  the  age  of  puberty  the 
brothei  ceases  to  be  a  ward,  but  the  sister  continues,  for  it  is  only  under 
the  lex  Julia  et  Papia  Poppaea,  and  by  title  of  maternity  [having 
borne  children  three  times],  that  women  are  emancipated  from  tutelage; 
except  in  the  case  of  vestal  virgins." — [Gains :  "  Institutes  " :  1 :  §§  144-5. 

"Women,  in  the  primitive  law  of  the  Romans,  were  imder  the  power 
of  their  father,  or  under  the  hand  of  their  husband ;  they  were  the  prop- 
erty of  another;  and  when  circumstances  had  made  them  sui  juris j 
tnatres  familias,  they  were  placed  under  a  perpetual  guardianship, 
the  supervision  of  their  agnates  [descendants  through  males,  from  a 
common  ancestor],  never  having  any  power  over  their  children.  The 
woman  was,  in  short,  as  is  elegantly  and  concisely  expressed  by  Ul- 
pian,  '  The  beginning  and  the  end  of  her  family,'  [familiae  suae  et  caput 
et  finis]." — [Ortolan :  ' '  Hist,  of  Roman  Law  " ;  Prichard  and  Nasmith's 
ed.,  1871:  p.  599. 

"All  women,  on  account  of  the  infirmity  of  their  judgment,  our 
ancestors  determined  should  be  under  the  power  of  tutors ;  these  men 
[a  class  of  lawyers]  have  discovered  sorts  of  tutors  who  are  themselves 
restrained  by  the  power  of  the  women. " — [Cicero :  Orat.  pro  Murena :  xii. 

'  'At  Rome,  women  .  .  were  long  under  a  kind  of  perpetual  guardian- 
ship [to  the  time  of  Claudius] ;  they  were  not  permitted  to  be  sureties 
for  any  one ;  and  it  was  only  under  the  later  emperors  that  they  were 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  4Y1 

allowed  to  be  guardians  to  their  own  children,  or  grand  <5hildren. 
Sometimes  the  punishments  inflicted  upon  women  were  less  severe 
than  upon  men." — [Lord  Mackenzie:  "Studies  in  Roman  Law": 
Edinburgh  ed.,  1880:  p.  79. 

"  If  an  only  child,  who  by  his  father's  death  had  just  come  into  a 
lai'ge  property,  died  himself  without  a  will,  the  nearest  agnate,  though 
he  were  only  a  fourth  or  fifth  cousin,  could  shut  out  the  widowed 
mother  from  all  share  in  the  estate  which  had  belonged  to  her  husband 
and  child.  So,  if  a  woman  died  intestate,  leaving  infant  children,  her 
agnate  ten  degrees  removed,  if  there  were  none  nearer,  could  prevent 
her  children  from  obtaining  the  least  share  in  any  property  she  might 
have  left, "— [Hadley :  ' '  Introd.  to  Romaa  Law  " ;  New  York  ed. ,  1880 : 
p.  284. 

XXVIII.  :  p.  150. — Cicero  says  of  the  Yoconian  Law  that  it  "  waa 
introduced  for  the  sake  of  the  advantage  of  men,  but  was  full  of  injus- 
tice toward  women.  For  why  should  not  a  woman  possess  property  I 
Why  may  a  vestal  virgin  become  an  heir,  while  her  own  mother  can- 
not ? "— [De  Repub. :  iii. :  7. 

He  further  says  that  Quintus  Voconius  "  did  not  take  away  an  in- 
heritance which  already  had  passed  to  any  virgin  or  matron,  but  he 
ordained  for  the  future  that  no  one  enrolled  in  the  census  after  the 
year  of  the  then  existing  censors,  should  make  either  virgin  or  matron 
his  heir." — [Orat.  in  Verrem:  Act.  II.:  I.:  42. 

He  mentions  an  instance  where  a  man  left  legal  heir  to  an  estate, 
by  a  will  which  also  stated  that  he  had  been  requested  to  transfer  it  to 
the  daughter  of  the  dying  owner,  obeyed  the  law,  and  retained  the  in- 
heritance.— [DeFinibus:  II.  17. 

Gains  indicates  the  way  in  which  the  Law  came  to  be  evaded  or 
mitigated : — 

"A  woman  who  cannot,  under  the  Voconian  Law,  be  instituted  as 
heiress  by  one  who  is  registered  as  having  a  hundred  thousand  ses- 
terces, can  yet  take  the  inheritance  left  for  her  fidei  commisso  "  \hy 
trusting  it  to  the  good  faith  of  the  nominal  heir]. — [Instit. :  H. :  273. 

Augustine's  judgment  of  the  Law  was  a  sharp  one : — 

"  At  that  time — I  mean  between  the  second  and  third  Punic  war — 
that  notorious  Lex  Voconia  was  passed,  which  prohibited  a  man  from 
making  a  woman,  even  an  only  daughter,  his  heir;  than  which  Law  I 
am  at  a  loss  to  conceive  what  could  be  more  unjust." — [Civ.  Dei: 
m. :  21. 

XXIX. :  p.  150. — "  Such  great  madness  possesses  some  men  that  they 
think  it  possible  that  disgrace  should  be  put  upon  them  by  a  woman  J 
What  matters  it  how  much  a  woman  possesses,  how  many  litter-bear- 


472  APPENDIX. 

ers  she  has,  how  spaciously  luxurious  is  her  sedan?  All  the  same  sh« 
is  an  inconsiderate  [or  impudent]  animal ;  and  unless  she  has  advanced 
in  philosophical  knowledge,  and  in  various  learning,  she  is  cruel  and 
incontinent  in  desires." — [Seneca:  Const.  Sapient. :  xiv. 

XXX. :  p.  150. — "Her  acuteness  of  understanding  [Calpumia's]  is  of 
the  highest,  her  moral  worth  also ;  she  loves  me,  which  is  the  index  of 
her  purity.  By  these  she  advances  in  that  relish  for  literary  cultui*e 
which  she  first  conceived  through  her  affection  for  me.  She  has  my 
writings,  which  she  eagerly  reads,  even  learns  by  heart.  .  .  If  at  an> 
time  I  recite  from  my  works,  she  sits  near,  concealed  behind  a  curtain, 
and  drinks  in  my  praises  with  greedy  ears.  She  sings  my  verses  too, 
and  adapts  them  to  the  cithern,  with  no  other  artist  to  teach  her  but 
love  —  who  is  the  best  possible  instructor." — [Pliny  :  (to  Hispulla, 
aunt  of  Calpumia) :  Ep.  iv. :  19. 

To  Calpumia  herself  he  writes,  somewhat  rhetorically,  a  little  ego- 
tistically, but  in  the  affectionate  tone  of  an  honest  and  courteous  gen- 
tleman : — 

"You  write  that  my  absence  affects  you  in  no  slight  degree,  and 
that  you  have  only  the  solace  that  you  have  my  books  instead  of  me, 
and  often  set  them  before  you  in  my  place.  It  is  pleasant  that  you  miss 
me,  and  that  you  find  rest  in  these  consolations ;  in  return,  I  eagerly 
read  your  letters,  and  take  them  up  repeatedly,  as  into  fresh  hands ; 
but  the  more  by  this  am  I  kindled  with  desire  for  yourself.  For  how 
much  of  delightf ulness  must  there  be  in  the  conversation  of  her  even 
whose  letters  have  so  much  that  is  agreeable."— [vi. :  7.  (also,  vii. :  5.) 

"You  [Maximus]  acted  properly  when  you  promised  a  gladiatorial 
combat  to  our  citizens  of  Verona,  by  whom  you  havB  so  long  been  be  • 
loved,  esteemed,  and  honored.  From  that  city  you  received  your  be- 
loved and  excellent  wife,  to  whose  memory  was  due  either  some  grand 
monument,  or  some  public  spectacle,  and  the  latter  the  most  import- 
ant, as  specially  suited  to  funeral  rites.  .  .  I  wish  that  the  African  pan- 
thers, of  which  you  had  provided  so  many,  had  amved  on  the  day  ap- 
pointed; but  though  they  failed,  detained  by  stormy  weather,  your 
desert  remains  the  same,  as  it  did  not  come  to  pass  through  you  that 
that  which  had  been  arranged  by  you  was  only  in  part  exhibited." — 
:Epis.  VI.  34. 

The  same  Pliny  mentions,  however,  several  noble  or  charming 
^omen;  among  them,  Arria,  who  carefully  concealed  from  her  sick 
husband  the  anguish  which  she  felt  at  the  death  of  their  son,  who  de- 
termined to  die  with  her  husband  on  his  condemnation,  and  who 
plunged  the  sword  into  her  breast,  saying  as  she  drew  it  back,  *  Paetus, 
it  is  not  painful,'  [Ep.  iii. :  16] :  Fannia,  her  grand-daughter,  of  a  simi- 
lar spirit,  wise,  pious,  steadfast,  pure,  as  well  as  pleasing  and  courteous, 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  F.  473 

who  twice  followed  her  husband  into  exile,  and  who  had  contracted  a 
dangerous  sickness  in  ministering  to  one  of  the  Vestal  Virgins  [vii. :  19]  ♦ 
the  wife  of  Macrinus,  who  would  have  been  held  singularly  exemplary, 
even  if  she  had  lived  in  former  times  [viii. :  5] :  especially  the  daughtei 
of  Fundanus,  not  yet  fourteen  years  old,  but  mature  in  wisdom,  unit- 
ing with  matronly  gravity  girhsh  sweetness,  and  a  virginal  modesty, 
[V. :  16]. 

Certainly  society  was  not  yet  so  corrupt  as  to  be  incapable  of  regener- 
ation, while  such  women  continued  in  it ;  but  it  becomes  the  more  sig 
nificant  that  Pliny  should  be  almost  singular  among  the  writers  of  his 
time  in  recording  their  excellence. 

XXXI. :  p.  150. — "Just  that  part  of  the  human  race  which  is  by  na- 
ture prone  to  secrecy  and  stealth,  on  account  of  their  weakness — I 
mean  the  female  sex — has  been  left  without  regulation  by  the  legisla- 
tor, which  is  a  great  mistake ;  .  .  f or  the  neglect  of  regulations  about 
women  may  not  only  be  regarded  as  a  neglect  of  half  the  entire  mat- 
ter, but,  in  proportion  as  woman's  nature  is  inferior  to  that  of  men  in 
capacity  of  virtue,  in  that  proportion  is  she  more  important  than  the 
two  halves  put  together.  .  .  For  women  are  accustomed  to  creep  into 
dark  places,  and  when  dragged  out  into  the  light  they  will  exert  their 
utmost  powers  of  resistance,  and  be  far  too  much  for  the  legislator." — 
[Plato:  "Laws":  VI.:  781. 

"The  other  element  [in  the  legend  of  Prometheus],  a  conviction  of 
the  vast  mischief  arising  to  men  from  women,  whom  yet  they  cannot 
dispense  with,  is  frequently  and  strongly  set  forth  in  several  of  the 
Greek  poets — by  Simonides  of  Amorgos,  and  Phokylides,  not  less  than 
by  Euripides."— [Grote :  ' '  History  of  Greece  " ;  London  ed. ,  1872 :  Vol. 
1. :  p.  73. 

So  ^schylus,  Father  of  Tragedy,  in  the  "Seven  against  Thebes" 
makes  Eteocles  say:  "Neither  in  woes,  nor  in  welcome  prosperity,  may 
[  be  associated  with  woman-kind ;  for  when  woman  prevails,  her  au- 
dacity is  more  than  anybody  can  live  with ;  and  when  she  is  frightened, 
she  is  a  still  greater  mischief  to  her  home  and  city."— [174-177. 

Aristophanes  freely  represents  the  Athenian  women  as  licentious 
and  stupid,  drunken,  thievish,  and  false;  their  'wild  eyes  swimming 
in  a  mist  of  wine.' 

Yet  the  Odyssey  was  then  radiant  with  the  picture  of  Nausicaa ;  and 
it  was  into  the  lips  of  Antigone  that  Sophocles  put  the  lofty  words  con- 
cerning the  unwritten  and  immovable  laws  of  the  Gods,  which  Cicero 
in  the  Avonderf  ul  passage  of  the  Republic  [III. :  17]  hardly  more  than 
echoes  and  amplifies. 

XXXII.:  p.  151. — "Before  Augustus  it  [concubinage]  had  had  no 


474  APPENDIi:. 

legal  appellation,  and  everything  leads  us  to  believe  that  it  was  not 
distinguished  from  illicit  and  unauthorized  connections.  But  undei 
this  emperor  it  was  completely  set  apart  from  such,  and  took  a  place 
among  the  agreements  authorized  by  natural  right  and  legally  recog- 
nized. .  .  Formed  by  mere  consent,  and  capable  of  being  dissolved  in 
the  same  way,  it  allowed  no  public  ceremony :  no  dowry  was  connected 
with  it :  the  woman  called  concubina,  amica,  convictrix,  had  not  the 
honorable  title  of  Mater-f amilias :  she  did  not  participate  in  the  honors 
of  her  husband,  she  only  shared  his  bed,  his  table,  and  his  affection." 

The  children  born  of  such  a  connection  had,  however,  the  same  rights 
in  regard  to  the  property  of  the  Mother  as  had  children  bom  in  wed- 
lock.— [Troplong :  "  De  I'lnfluence  du  Ohristianisme  " ;  Paris  ed. ,  1868 : 
pp.  238-244. 

"In  regard  to  women,  indeed,  those  laws  of  your  fathers,  which 
used  to  be  such  an  encouragement  to  modesty  and  sobriety,  have  also 
fallen  into  desuetude ;  .  .  when  the  abstinence  of  women  from  wine 
was  carried  so  far,  that  a  matron,  for  opening  the  compartment  of  a 
wine-cellaj*,  was  starved  to  death  by  her  friends — while,  in  the  times  of 
Romulus,  for  merely  tasting  wine,  Mecenius  killed  his  wife,  and  suf- 
fered nothing  for  the  deed.  .  .  Now,  wine-bibbing  is  so  common  among 
them  that  the  kiss  is  never  offered  with  their  will :  and  as  for  divorce, 
they  long  for  it,  as  if  it  were  the  natural  consequence  of  marriage." — 
[Tertullian :  Apolog. :  6. 

Phny  mentions  the  killing  of  the  wife  in  the  time  of  Romulus,  for 
drinking  wine,  as  one  of  several  examples. — [Nat.  Hist. :  xrv. :  14. 

"  It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  slavery  exercised  at  Rome,  as  every- 
where, the  most  deplorable  influence  on  conjugal  morality.  If  it  had 
been  one  of  the  reasons  which  had  there  always  caused  the  iniideHty 
of  husbands  to  be  leniently  regarded,  it  was  only  natural  that,  in 
connection  with  the  sad  progress  already  mentioned  in  the  direction  of 
looseness  of  manners  and  of  the  new  liberty  of  women,  these  should 
more  and  more  aspire  to  enjoy  the  same  freedom  with  the  men,  or 
should  at  least  take  the  violation  of  conjugal  faith  on  the  part  of  their 
husbands  as  an  excuse  for  their  own  conduct.  There  was  also,  no  doubt, 
a  peculiar  temptation  for  them,  in  the  certainty  of  finding  it  always 
possible  to  select  among  their  slaves  obsequious  and  discreet  lovers ; 
and  everything  leads  us  to  believe  that  liaisons  of  tliis  sort  were  by  no 
means  rare  exceptions.  .  .  But  the  women  were  further  exposed  to 
other  corrupting  influences,  most  pernicious  in  their  nature.  We  may 
not  base  too  large  an  inference  on  the  demoralizing  effects  of  a  certain 
sort  of  literature :  but  we  certainly  are  justified  in  considering  as  among 
the  symptoms  of  a  frightful  demoralization  such  productions  as  the 
Elegies,  and  the  Art  of  Love  of  Ovid,  which  perhaps  surpass  in  im- 
morahty,  fundamentally  as  well  as  in  form,  everything  of  that  sort 


IfOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  475 

which  has  ever  been  written.  We  may  properly  attribute  an  influence 
still  more  depraving  to  the  license  exhibited  in  the  works  and  embel 
lishments  of  art.  Already  Propertius  had  complained  of  the  statues, 
and  mural  paintings,  which  perverted  women  and  girls.  But  the  very 
worst  of  all  were,  beyond  dispute,  the  fascinations  of  the  spectacles, 
and  the  excitements  of  the  banquets— both  of  which  are  described  by 
Tacitus  as  the  two  greatest  dangers  which  menaced  innocence  and 
purity  of  manners." — [Friedlaender :  "Moeurs  Romaines";  Paris  ed., 
1865:  Tom.  I.:  pp.  372-73. 

XXXni. :  p.  151.—"  They  carry  on  then"  affairs,  therefore  [the  Ger- 
man women],  fenced  about  with  chastity;  corrupted  by  no  enticements 
of  spectacles,  by  no  excitements  of  convivial  feasts.  Men  and  women 
alike  are  ignorant  of  the  secrets  of  correspondence.  Adultery  is  most 
rare  among  so  numerous  a  people  ;  the  punishment  of  those  committing 
it  is  inunediate,  and  at  the  pleasure  of  the  husband.  .  .  No  indulgence 
is  shown  to  a  declared  unchastity :  neither  by  beauty,  nor  by  youth, 
nor  by  riches,  can  it  secure  a  husband ;  for  no  one  there  laughs  at 
vices,  nor  is  corrupting  and  being  corrupted  styled  '  the  way  of  the 
world.'  Better  yet  are  those  states  in  which  only  the  virgins  marry. 
They  thus  take  one  husband,  as  one  body,  and  one  life,  in  such  a  way 
that  no  thought  or  desire  may  range  further  than  him ;  nor  do  they 
love  in  him  the  husband  only,  but  as  it  were  marriage  itself.  To  limit 
the  number  of  children,  or  put  to  death  any  of  the  later-born,  is  es- 
teemed an  infamous  wickedness ;  and  good  moral  customs  avail  more 
there  than  do  good  laws  elsewhere." — [Tacitus:  "Mor.  German.":  xix, 

XXXIV. :  p.  152. — The  epigrams  of  Martial  referring  to  Claudia^ 
now  commonly  conceded  to  have  been  the  Christian  wife  of  the  Pu- 
dens  who  is  mentioned  with  her  by  Paul,  2  Tim.  iv.  21 — are,  particu- 
larly, that  in  L.  rv. :  Ep.  13,  on  the  occasion  of  her  marriage,  and  thai 
in  L.  XI. :  Ep.  53,  celebrating  her  beauty  and  grace.  Part  of  the  latteJ 
has  been  thus  metrically  translated : 

"  Though  British  skies  first  beamed  on  Claudia's  face, 
Her  beauty  far  outvies  the  Latin  race  : 
E'en  Grecian  nymphs  her  form  cannot  excel, 
Or  Roman  matrons  play  the  queen  so  well." 

XXXV.:  p.  152. — *'It  becomes  both  men  and  women  who  marry, 
to  form  their  union  with  the  approval  of  the  bishop,  that  their  mar- 
nage  may  be  according  to  the  Lord,  and  not  after  their  own  lust.  Let 
aU  things  be  done  to  the  honour  of  God."— [Ep.  of  Ignatius  to  Poly- 
cai-p:  c.  V. 

"Whence  are  we  to  find  [words]  enough  fully  to  tell  the  happiness 
of  that  marriage  which  the  church  cements,  and  the  oblation  confirms, 


476  APPENDIX. 

and  the  benediction  signs  and  seals  ?  .  .  Between  the  two  echo  psalmi 
and  hymns  :  and  they  mutually  challenge  each  other  which  shal 
better  sing  to  the  Lord."— [Tertullian:  Ad  Uxor. :  II. :  8. 

"A  marriage  once  for  all  entered  upon  in  the  City  of  our  God,  where, 
even  from  the  fii*st  union  of  the  two,  the  man  and  the  woman,  mar- 
riage beai"s  a  sacramental  character,  can  in  no  way  be  dissolved  but  by 
the  death  of  one  of  them." — [Augustine:  "On  Marriage":  17.  Ox* 
ford  ed. 

"Thus  marriage  is  itself  a  church  in  miniature,  the  germ  whence 
springs  first  the  household  Church,  then  of  households  is  composed  the 
community,  and  of  various  communities  the  great  edifice  of  the  uni- 
versal Church,  the  bride  and  body  of  Christ.  And  thus  Christian  mar- 
riage raises  a  man's  sense  of  his  own  worth  and  dignity,  and  makes 
him  feel  that  he  is  not  simply  an  individual,  but  part  of  a  higher  and 
more  sacred  whole,  joined  in  a  covenant  whereof  the  Church's  union 
with  the  Lord  is  the  type. "— [Dollinger  :  "First  Age  of  the  Church " ; 
London  ed.,  1877:  Vol.  2:  p.  251. 

XXXVI. :  p.  152. — Athenaeus  quotes  from  Posidonius:  "In  one  in- 
stance, a  man  left  it  in  his  will  that  some  beautiful  women  whom  he 
had  purchased  as  slaves,  should  engage  in  single  combat :  .  .  but  the 
people  would  not  tolerate  such  notorious  proceedings,  and  declared  the 
will  invalid." — [Deipnosophistae,  IV. :  39. 

Suetonius  mentions  that  under  Domitian  were  hunts  of  wild  beasts, 
and  fights  of  gladiators,  in  the  Circus,  even  at  night,  under  the  light 
of  chandeliers  :  that  these  were  not  battles  of  men  only,  but  also  of 
women  :  and  that  young  girls  contended  in  races  in  the  Stadium, 
while  the  Emperor  presided,  shod  in  sandals,  clothed  in  a  purple  toga, 
wearing  a  golden  crown,  etc. — [Domit. :  rv. 

Martial  refers  to  such  combats  of  women  with  wild  beasts. — [I. :  Ep.  6. 

Juvenal  says  :  "What  modesty  can  a  woman  exhibit  when  covered 
with,  a  helmet,  who  flies  from  what  belongs  to  her  sex,  and  loves  feats  of 
strength  ?  .  .  What  a  fine  show  of  things  it  would  be,  if  an  auction  were 
made  of  your  wife's  possessions :  sword-belt,  and  gauntlets,  and  crests 
of  helmets,  and  the  half -armor  for  the  left  leg:  or,  if  she  undertakes 
different  sorts  of  contests,  you  will  be  happy  when  your  young  wife 
sells  her  metal-greaves.  Yet  these  are  the  very  same  women  [he  scorn- 
fully adds]  who  perspire  in  their  bordered  robes,  and  whose  delicate 
frames  even  a  slight  silken  texture  harasses." — [Sat.  vi. :  252-260. 

XXXVII.:  p.  153.— "We  see  in  the  clever  letters  of  St.  Jerome  to 
the  Roman  matrons,  who  claimed  descent  from  the  Gracchi  and 
Emihi,  .  .  to  what  a  pitch  the  Church  had  brought  female  education. 
It  formed  a  better  estimate  of  the  sex  which  antiquity  had  condemned 
to  spinning  wool,  in  hopeless  ignorance  of  things  of  divine  or  of  political 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  F.  477 

interest.  St.  Jerome  never  appeared  more  noble  than  in  stooping  to  teach 
Liieta  how  to  train  her  child^  by  putting  letters  of  box- wood  or  ivory  un- 
der its  eyes,  and  rewarding  its  early  efforts  by  a  flower  or  a  kiss.  Oi 
old  it  had  been  said,  '  Maxima  debetur  puero  reverentia ' ;  but  the  saintly 
doctor  went  further,  and  made  Lseta's  daughter  the  angel  of  her  house ; 
and  it  was  her  task  to  begin,  when  a  mere  baby,  the  conversion  of  her 
grandfather,  a  priest  of  the  old  gods,  by  springing  upon  his  knee  and 
singing  the  Alleluia,  in  spite  of  his  displeasure.  .  .  The  Vulgate  was 
begun  simply  to  satisfy  the  keen  impatience  [for  knowledge  of  the 
Scriptures]  of  Paula  and  Eustochia ;  it  was  to  them  that  he  dedicated  the 
books  of  Joshua,  Judges,  Kings,  Ruth,  Esther,  the  Psalms,  Isaiah,  and 
the  twelve  minor  Prophets ;  declaring  in  his  preface  that  to  them  was 
owing  the  influence  which  caused  him  again  to  take  up  the  plough  and 
trace  so  laborious  a  furrow,  to  remove  the  brambles  which  ceaselessly 
germinate  in  the  field  of  Holy  Scripture ;  and  that  to  them  must  lie  his 
appeal  from  all  who  would  doubt  the  exactness  of  the  version.  '  You 
are,'  he  said,  '  competent  judges,  in  controversies  as  to  texts,  upon  the 
original  Hebrew;  compare  it  with  my  translation,  and  see  if  I  have 
risked  a  single  word.'" — [Fred.  Ozanam  :  "Hist,  of  Civilization  in 
Fifth  Cent.";  London  ed.,  1867  :  Vol.  1  :  pp.  65-6;  Vol.  2  :  pp.  79-80. 

XXX Vni. :  p.  154. — "Unjust  as  it  is  to  measure  the  ultimate  tend- 
ency of  an  historical  influence  by  its  incipient  phenomena,  there  does 
appear  to  us  a  manifest  trace,  in  the  first  age  itself,  of  an  ennobling  in 
fluence  [on  Woman]  from  the  recognized  spiritual  equality  of  the 
sexes.  The  women  of  Galilee,  and  the  sisters  of  Bethany,  the  helpers 
of  Paul  in  Macedonia  and  Corinth,  the  martyi-ed  deaconesses  of 
Lyons  and  Carthage,  were  sui'ely  lifted  by  their  faith  into  a  conscious- 
ness of  the  claims  of  the  soul,  to  which  nothing  in  Pagan  antiquity  can 
present  a  moral  parallel.  .  .  Wherever  the  characteristic  sentiments  of 
Christianity  have  had  free  action^  wherever  the  faith  has  prevailed  that 
life  is  a  divine  trust,  committed  to  souls  dear  to  God,  equal  among 
themselves,  and  each  the  germ  of  an  immortality,  there,  and  there 
alone,  has  domestic  affection  been  so  touched  with  reverence  and  con- 
fidence as  to  retain  its  freshness  to  the  end,  and  afford  a  chastening 
discipline  through  life." — [James  Martineau  :  "Miscellanies";  Boston 
ed.,  1852  :  pp.  270-1. 

XXXIX.:  p.  155. — "It  is  praiseworthy  to  rule  one's  servants  with 
moderation ;  and  thought  is  to  be  taken  in  regard  to  a  slave,  not  as  to 
how  much  he  may  be  made  to  suffer  with  impunity,  but  as  to  what 
the  nature  of  equity  and  goodness  will  permit  to  thee;  which  com- 
mands us  to  spare  our  captives,  and  those  whom  we  have  bought  for  a 
price.    .    .   Although  all  things  are  lawful  toward  a  slave,  there  is 


4T8  APPENDIX. 

sometliing  whicli  the  common  right  of  living  creatures  forhids  to  b€ 
allowed  toward  a  man,  because  he  is  of  the  same  nature  as  thou  art."- 
[Seneca  :  De  Clem. :  I. :  18. 

"He  mistakes,  who  thinks  that  servitude  descends  upon  the  whole 
man ;  the  better  part  of  him  is  excepted  from  it.  The  bodies  are  sub- 
ject, and  under  control  of  the  master ;  but  the  mind  has  a  privilege  of 
its  own — which  is  so  free  and  restless  that  it  cannot  be  so  restrained  in 
the  prison  in  which  it  is  inclosed  as  that  it  may  not  use  its  own  force 
accomplish  great  things,  and  pass  into  the  unbounded,  as  companion  of 
the  celestials.  .  .  The  same  beginnings  were  for  all  men ;  the  same 
original ;  no  man  is  nobler  than  another,  except  as  his  genius  is  more 
exalted,  and  he  is  more  apt  to  good  arts."' — [De  Benef. :  III. :  20,  28. 

"Are  they  thy  slaves?  certainly  they  are  men.  Are  they  slaves  ? 
rather,  thy  companions ;  thy  humble  friends ;  thy  fellow-servants ;  if 
thou  art  mindful  how  much  is  due  to  Fortune  in  the  case  of  both.  .  . 
Live  with  thy  servant  courteously ;  admit  him  also  as  a  companion  to 
thy  discourse,  to  counsel,  and  to  social  intercourse.  .  .  Let  some  of 
them  sup  with  thee  because  they  are  worthy ;  some,  that  they  may  be- 
come so.   .   .   Let  them  rather  honor  than  fear  thee." — [Seneca  :  Epis. 

XLVII. 

The  younger  Pliny  several  times  mentions  his  own  humane  treatment 
of  his  slaves,  and  refers  severely  to  the  cruelty  of  other  masters. — [See 
Epist.  m. :  14 ;  v. :  19 ;  viil. :  16 ;  eif  al. 

But  the  general  spirit  of  even  kindly  and  philosophical  men  toward 
the  slaves  whom  they  had  most  occasion  personally  to  like  was  proba- 
bly fairly  expressed  by  Cicero  in  one  of  his  letters  to  Atticus: — "I  have 
nothing  further  that  I  may  write  to  thee.  And,  by  Hercules,  I  have 
been  a  good  deal  disturbed.  For  Sositheus,  my  reader,  an  agreeable 
youth,  has  died ;  and  it  has  affected  me  more  than  it  would  seem  that 
the  death  of  a  slave  ought  to." — [Ep.  ad.  Attic. :  I. :  12. 

XL. :  p.  155.— "  To  govern  ill  is  disadvantageous  to  both  [master  and 
slave] ;  for  the  same  thing  is  useful  to  the  part  and  to  the  whole,  to  the 
body  and  the  soul ;  but  the  slave  is,  as  it  were,  a  part  of  the  master,  as 
though  he  were  an  animated  part  of  his  body,  though  separate.  For 
which  reason,  a  mutual  utility  and  friendship  may  subsist  between  ihQ 
master  and  the  slave ;  I  mean  when  they  are  placed  by  nature  in  that 
relation  to  each  other;  for  the  contrary  is  the  case  with  those  who  are 
reduced  to  slavery  by  custom,  or  by  conquest. " — [Aristotle :  * '  Econom- 
ics": L:  6. 

XLI. :  p.  155.— Suetonius  mentions  Gnipho  as  having  been  exposed 
and  enslaved — ^whom  he  describes  as  a  man  of  great  genius,  well  read 
in  Grreek  as  well  as  in  Latm,  and  who  when  teaching  at  Eome  had 
Cicero  for  one  of  his  pupils. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  479 

He  speaks  in  the  same  way  of  Caius  Melissus,  who  was  afterware 
a  favorite  friend  of  Mecsenas,  and  of  Augustus,  and  who  was  ap 
pointed  by  the  latter  Curator  of  the  Library  in  the  portico  of  Octavia. 
— [111.  Gramm.  Vll. :  XXI. 

XLII. :  p.  156. — "The  exportation  of  slaves  especially  invited  them 
[the  Cilicians]  to  criminal  courses,  since  this  traffic  was  extremely  lucra- 
tive ;  for  on  the  one  hand  they  easily  captured  the  slaves,  and  on  the 
other  hand  Delos  was  not  far  off — a  large  and  opulent  seat  of  trade,  which 
in  a  g«ngle  day  could  receive  and  send  away  ten  thousand  slaves.  .  . 
The  pirates,  observing  the  facility  with  which  slaves  could  be  procured, 
went  forth  in  united  bands,  making  slaves  and  selling  them." — [Strabo : 
XIV.:  5;  (Oxford  ed.,  1807;  Tom.  II.:  p.  954.) 

' '  The  origin  of  the  Latin  word  for  Slave  is  supposed  to  be  found  in  the 
cu'cumstance  that  those  who  by  the  law  of  war  were  liable  to  be  killed 
were  sometimes  preserved  by  their  victors,  and  were  hence  called 
servants. " — [Augustine:  Civ.  Dei:  Xix. :  15. 

XLIII. :  p.  156.— "In  Sicily,  Plato  visited  the  court  of  Dionysius 
the  elder.  But  in  spite  of  his  close  intimacy  with  Dion,  he  gave  great 
offence  there  by  his  plain  speaking,  and  the  tyi'ant  in  wrath  delivered 
up  the  troublesome  moraliser  to  the  Spartan  ambassador,  Pollis,  by 
whom  he  was  exposed  for  sale  in  the  slave-market  of  -^gina.  Ran- 
somed by  Anniceris,  a  Cyrenian,  he  thence  returned  to  his  native  city." 
— [Zeller :  ' '  Plato,  and  the  older  Academy  " ;  London  ed.,  1876 :  pp.  23-4. 

The  statement  of  which  Zeller  thus  gives  the  substance  appears,  with 
variations,  in  Diodorus,  Diogenes  Laertius,  Plutarch,  and  others,  and  is 
referred  to  by  Seneca  [Ep.  47],  and  by  Lactantius  [Inst.  m. :  25]. 
President  Felton  repeats  the  statement,  in  its  fullest  extent,  and  with 
many  picturesque  particulars,  in  his  "Lectures  on  Greece,"  Vol.  2: 
pp.  30-31. 

XLIV. :  p.  156. — "In  the  third  book  of  his  History,  Epitimaeus  said 
that  the  city  of  the  Corinthians  was  so  flourishing  that  it  possessed  f  oro" 
hundi-ed  and  sixty  thousand  slaves.  On  which  account  I  imagine  it 
was  that  the  Pythian  priestess  called  them  '  The  people  who  measured 
with  a  choenix'  [a  slave's  daily  allowance  of  meal].  But  Ctesicles, 
in  the  third  book  of  his  Chronicles,  says  that  in  the  hundred  and  fif- 
teenth Olympiad,  there  was  an  investigation  at  Athens,  conducted  by 
Demetrius  Phalereus,  into  the  number  of  the  inhabitants  of  Attica,  and 
the  Athenians  were  found  to  amount  to  twenty-one  thousand,  the 
Metics  [resident  aliens]  to  ten  thousand,  and  the  slaves  to  four  hundred 
thousand.  .  .  And  Aristotle,  in  his  history  of  the  constitution  of  the 
Mgmetdd,  says  that  the  JEginetans  had  four  hundred  and  seventy  tliou 
sand  slaves." — [Athenaeus:  Deipnosophistse :  vi. :  103. 


480  APPEjVDI.Y. 

Tlie  ratio  of  four  persons  in  a  household  to  one  adult  citizen  or  aliec 
gives  the  numbers  mentioned  m  the  Lecture.  The  slaves,  of  course, 
were  counted  by  the  head,  like  cattle,  not  as  representing  famihes. 

XLV. :  p.  156. — "Early  in  the  morning  all  the  gold  and  silver  wa* 
collected ;  at  the  fourth  hour  the  signal  for  plundering  cities  v^as  given 
to  the  soldiers.  .  .  One  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  persons  [capitum 
humanorum]  were  led  into  bondage.  .  .  Paullus  then  marched  dowr 
to  the  sea,  at  Oricum,  the  minds  of  his  soldiers  being  by  no  means  sat- 
isfied, as  had  been  reckoned  upon  by  him." — [Livy :  Histor. :  XLV. :  34. 

' '  The  Saturnalia  [after  the  capture  of  Pindenissus]  were  thoroughly 
hilarious.  To  the  soldiers  I  gave  up  the  booty,  excepting  the  horses 
The  slaves  were  sold  on  the  third  day  of  the  Saturnalia.  While  I 
write  this,  the  sum  amounts,  as  reckoned  at  the  tribunal,  to  twelve 
thousand  sestertia"  [at  that  time  about  $530,000]. — [Cicero  :  Ep.  ad 
Attic:  v.:  20. 

The  statement  of  the  thirty  thousand  reduced  to  bondage  by  Fabius, 
at  Tarentum,  is  made  by  Livy :  Histor. :  xxvii. :  16. 

XLVI. :  p.  156. — "The  Chians  had  more  domestic  slaves  than  any 
other  state,  with  the  exception  of  Lacedaemon,  and  their  offences  were 
always  more  severely  punished  because  of  their  number." — [Thu- 
cydides:  vill. :  40. 

This  would  give  nearly  or  quite  a  half  milhon  of  slaves  to  Chios.  It 
is  possible,  however,  as  Jowett  suggests,  that  as  Thucydides  '  has  not 
distinguished  clearly  between  their  relative  and  absolute  number,'  what 
he  means  is  that  the  slaves  were  there  more  numerous  than  elsewhere 
in  proportion  to  the  free  inhabitants. 

XL  VII.  :  p.  157. — "He  [Crassus]  bought  slaves  who  were  builders 
and  architects,  and  when  he  had  collected  more  than  five  hundred,  he 
made  it  his  practice  to  buy  houses  that  were  on  fire,  and  those  in  the 
neighbourhood,  so  that  the  greatest  part  of  Rome,  at  one  time  or  an- 
other, came  mto  liis  hands.  .  .  Though  he  had  many  silver  mines, 
and  much  valuable  land,  and  laborers  to  work  in  it,  all  this  was  no- 
thing in  comparison  of  his  slaves — such  a  number  and  variety  did  he 
possess,  of  excellent  readers,  amanuenses,  silver-smiths,  table-waiters, 
etc."— [Plutarch:  "Lives";  Boston  ed.,  1859:  Vol.  3:  pp.  332-3. 

' '  But  now,  our  very  food  and  drink  are  preserved  from  theft  by  the 
ring  [sealing  the  doors].  This  the  legions  of  our  slaves  have  brought 
about,  and  the  swarms  of  those  foreign-born,  in  the  house ;  on  account 
of  whom  a  nomenclator  has  to  be  attached  to  them.  .  .  Csecilius  Isi- 
dorus  declared  by  his  will  that  though  he  had  suffered  many  losses  by 
the  civil  war,  he  yet  left  four  thousand  one  hundred  and  sixteen  slaves- 


NOTE^  TO  LECTURE  F.  481 

"three  tliousand  six  hundred  yoke  of  oxen,  and  two  hundred  and  fifty* 
seven  thousand  heads  of  other  sorts  of  cattle." — [Pliny:  Nat.  Hist.: 
XXXIII. :  6,  47. 

*' At  one  time,  formerly,  a  decree  was  declared  by  the  Senate  that  a 

■  certain  dress  should  distinguish  the  slaves  from  the  freemen ;  but  it  at 
once  appeared  what  peril  was  imminent  if  our  slaves  should  have  be- 

^un  to  number  us." — [Seneca:  De  Clem.  :  I. :  24. 

XL VIII.  :  p.  157. — "And  thou  indeed  makest  mention  of  acres  of 
land,  so  many  and  so  many,  and  of  houses,  ten  or  twenty,  or  even 
more,  and  of  baths  as  many,  and  of  slaves  a  thousand,  or  twice  as 
many,  and  of  chariots  fastened  with  silver  and  overlaid  with  gold ;  but 
I  say  this,  that  if  each  one  of  you  that  are  rich  were  to  leave  this  [com- 
pamtive]  poverty,  and  were  possessed  of  a  whole  world,  .  .  I  would 
not  say  that  those  who  are  thus  rich  are  worth  three  farthings,  when 
they  are  cast  out  of  the  kingdom." — [Cluysostom :  Hom.  on  Matt. 
Ixiii.:  Opera;  Venice,  1741:  Tom.  7:  p.  633. 

XLIX.  :  p.  157. — Boeckh's  careful  calculation  estimates  each  com- 
mon slave  in  Attica,  either  in  the  mines  or  in  the  house,  as  worth  on 
the  average,  in  the  time  of  Demosthenes,  150  drachmas,  or  less  than 
$30  of  our  money.  Those  skilled  in  any  special  industry,  as  chair- 
making,  leather- work,  sword-cutlery,  etc.,  were  of  course  worth  more, 
in  proportion  to  the  profit  returned  to  the  owners.  At  the  same  time 
the  price  of  a  common  horse  was  nearly  $60 ;  of  a  yoke  of  mules,  from 
$100  to  $150 ;  of  a  trained  saddle  horse,  $225.— ["  Pub.  Econ.  of  Athens  " ; 
London  ed.,  1842:  pp.  68-9,  74. 

Wallon  estimates  the  price  of  slaves  in  Greece,  between  the  Pelopon- 
nesian  war  and  the  reign  of  Alexander,  at  $35  to  $43  for  those  em- 
ployed in  the  mines,  or  in  other  inferior  forms  of  labor ;  at  $52  to  $70 
for  slave-artisans;  at  $87  to  $125  for  foremen  in  the  work-shops;  with 
corresponding  prices  for  domestic  servants,  according  to  the  character 
of  their  service.  The  prices  rose,  as  intelligence  and  learning  were  paid 
for,  as  high  as  $175  or  even  $260 ;  they  mounted  still  higher  for  slaves 
put  to  the  uses  of  luxury,  reaching  from  $350  to  $520,  and  indeed  in 
5uch  cases  no  limit  to  price  can  be  fixed : — 

"  In  fact,"  he  says,  "  from  the  moment  at  which  man  becomes  only 
an  instrument,  a  subject  of  traffic,  he  is  worth  no  more  than  that  which 
the  use  of  him  amounts  to ;  and  if,  by  combinations  of  circumstances, 
more  of  such  merchandise  is  offered  than  is  called  for,  the  value  of  it 
sinks  below  the  price  of  the  most  common  articles ;  as  in  Thrace  men 
were  sometimes  exchanged  for  salt." — ["  Hist,  de  L'Esclavage  " ;  Paris 
ed.,  1879:  Tom.  1:  pp.  219-20. 

Horace,  himself  the  son  of  a  manumitted  slave,  makes  a  house 
31 


482  APPENDIX. 

servant  speak  of  Mmself  as  having  been  purchased  for  fire  hundred' 
drachmas,  about  $90. — [Sat.  II. :  7. 

For  pui'poses  of  special  luxury,  however,  or  of  sensual  gratification, 
sums  immensely  larger  were  paid.  Martial  speaks  of  slaves  bought- 
for  a  hundred  thousand  sesterces,  or  for  two  hundred  thousand,  though. 
he  mentions  these  as  instances  of  extravagance. — [Ep.  iii. :  62;  xi. :  70. 

Seneca  also  speaks  of  slaves  bought  by  Calvisius  Sabinus,  for  a  hun- 
dred thousand  sesterces  each — one  to  hold  Homer  before  him,  another 
Hesiod,  etc.— [Epist.  xxvii. 

Suetonius,  also,  states  that  Daphnides,  a  grammarian,  was  bought  by 
Q.  Catullus  for  two  hundred  thousand  sesterces,  and  was  soon  after 
made  a  freedman. — [111.  Gramm. :  m. 

The  elder  Pliny  relates  instances  like  these : — 

"Such  [slaves  brought  over  sea]  was  Publius,  the  founder  of  our 
mimic  scenes,  his  cousin  Manilius  Antiochus,  the  founder  of  astronomy, 
also  Staberius  Eros,  our  first  grammarian ;  all  of  whom  our  ancestors 
saw  brought  over  in  the  same  vessel.  .  .  The  highest  price  ever  paid 
for  a  man  born  in  slavery,  up  to  this  time,  so  far  as  I  have  discovered, 
was  that  paid  for  Daphnus,  the  master  of  the  art  of  grammar — M.  Scau- 
rus,  the  first  man  in  the  state,  paying  the  price  for  him  of  seven  hun- 
dred thousand  sesterces  [nearly  $30,000].  In  our  time,  comic  actors 
have  surpassed  this  price  not  a  little,  but  they  have  been  paymg  for 
their  o\vn  freedom."— [Nat.  Hist.:  XXXV. :  58;  vii. :  40. 

L.  :  p.  157. — "Do  you  think  that  Hellenes  ought  to  enslave  Hel- 
lenes, or  allow  others  to  enslave  them,  as  far  as  they  can  help?  Should 
not  their  custom  be  to  spare  them,  considering  the  danger  which  there 
is  that  the  whole  race  may  one  day  fall  under  the  yoke  of  the  bar- 
barians ? 

"  To  spare  them  is  infinitely  better. 

"  Then  no  Hellene  should  be  owned  by  them  as  a  slave;  that  is  a  rule- 
which  they  wiU  observe,  and  advise  the  other  Hellenes  to  observe." — 
[Plato:  "Repubhc":  V.:  469. 

"  But  may  we  not  also  say  that  the  soul  of  the  slave  is  utterly  cor- 
rupt, and  that  no  man  of  sense  ought  to  trust  them  as  a  class  ?  And 
the  wisest  of  our  poets,  speaking  of  Zeus,  says: — *  Far-seeing  Zeus  take* 
away  half  the  understanding  of  men  whom  the  day  of  slavery  subdues.* 
,  .  Two  alternatives  are  open  to  us, — not  to  have  the  slaves  of  the  same 
country,  or,  if  possible,  speaking  the  same  language ;  in  this  way  they 
will  be  more  easily  held  in  subjection :  secondly,  we  should  tend  them 
carefully,  not  only  out  of  regard  to  them,  but  yet  more  out  of  respect 
for  ourselves.  And  the  right  treatment  of  slaves  is  to  behave  pix^perly 
to  them,  and  to  do  them,  if  possible,  even  more  justice  than  to  those 
who  are  our  equals.    .    .   Slaves  ought  to  be  punished  as  they  deserve,. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  48^ 

and  not  admonished  as  if  they  were  freemen,  which  will  only  makt 
them  conceited."— ["  Laws  ":  vi. :  777. 

LI. :  p.  157. — "  We  heard  long  ago  that  Nicias,  the  son  of  Niceratus, 
kept  a  thousand  men  employed  in  the  silver  mines,  whom  he  let  on 
hire  to  Sosias  of  Thrace,  on  condition  that  he  should  give  him  for  each 
an  obolus  a-day ,  free  of  all  charges ;  and  this  number  he  always  sup- 
plied undiminished.  Hipponicus,  also,  had  six  hundred  slaves,  let  out 
at  the  same  rate,  which  brought  him  in  a  clear  mina  a-day  :  while 
Philemonidcs  had  three  hundred,  which  brought  him  half  a  mina ;  and 
others  had  other  complements  of  slaves,  according,  I  suppose,  to  their 
respective  resources."— [Xenophon:  "  Revenues  of  Athens":  iv. :  15. 

Xenophon  recommends  that  the  State  buy  the  slaves,  and  work 
them  on  its  own  account ;  and  adds  that  *  when  they  are  marked  with 
the  public  mark,  and  a  penalty  is  denounced  against  one  who  sells  or 
exports  them,  how  could  any  one  steal  them  ? '  He  estimates  that 
when  the  number  of  such  slaves  shall  have  been  made  up  to  10,000, 
the  yearly  revenue  from  them  to  the  State  will  be  a  hundred  talents. 

LII. :  p.  157. — "  Property  is  as  an  instrument  to  living  ;  and  an  es- 
tate is  a  multitude  of  instruments :  so  a  slave  is  a  living  instrument, 
and  every  servant  is  an  instrument  more  valuable  than  other  instru- 
ments. .  .  This  fully  explains  what  is  the  nature  of  a  slave,  and  what 
is  his  capacity ;  for  that  being  who  by  nature  is  not  his  own,  but  totally 
another's,  and  yet  is  a  man,  is  a  slave  by  nature ;  and  that  man  is  the 
property  of  another,  who  is  his  mere  chattel,  though  he  is  still  a  man; 
but  a  chattel  is  an  instrument  for  use,  separate  from  the  body.  .  . 
He  then  is  by  nature  formed  a  slave,  who  is  fitted  to  become  the  chat- 
tel of  another  person,  and  on  that  account  is  so,  having  just  reason 
enough  to  perceive  that  there  is  such  a  faculty,  without  being  endued 
with  the  use  of  it.  .  .  It  is  clear  then  that  some  men  ai'e  free  by  na- 
ture, and  that  others  are  slaves,  and  that  in  the  case  of  the  latter  the 
lot  of  slavery  is  both  advantageous  and  just. " — [Aristotle :  ' '  Politics  " : 
I. :  4,  5. 

UII. :  p.  158. — Plutarch  criticizes  Cato  for  thus  taking  all  the  work 
he  could  out  of  his  stout  and  serviceable  slaves,  the  only  sort  that  he 
would  buy,  and  then  turning  them  off,  when  he  could  not  sell  them, 
in  their  old  age.  The  moralist  judges  that  a  man  of  kindly  nature 
would  have  taken  some  care  even  of  worn-out  horses  and  dogs,  still 
more  of  slaves,  and  not  have  treated  them  like  worn-out  shoes,  or 
broken  dishes.  He  also  mentions  the  fact  that  the  tough  old  Roman 
was  accustomed  to  scourge  with  leather-thongs  slaves  who  had  not 
waited  at  table  to  his  satisfaction. —["  Lives";  Boston  ed.,  1859  :  VoL 
2:  pp.  321-3,  344. 


4:81  APPENDIX. 

LIV. :  p.  158. — '*  Through  fear  of  their  youth  and  great  numbers 
[of  the  Helots]  they  [the  Lacedemonians]  even  perpetrated  the  follow- 
ing deed :  they  made  proclamation  that  as  many  of  them  as  claimed  to 
have  done  the  state  most  service  against  the  enemy  should  be  picked 
out,  professing  that  they  would  give  them  their  Uberty;  thus  applying 
a  test  to  them,  and  thinking  that  those  who  severally  claimed  to  be 
first  made  free,  would  also,  through  their  high  spirit,  be  most  ready  to 
attack  them.  Having  thus  selected  as  many  as  two  thousand,  the 
Helots  crowned  themselves,  and  went  round  to  the  temples,  on  the 
strength  of  having  gained  their  freedom  :  but  the  Spartans  soon  after 
made  aAvay  with  them,  and  no  one  ever  knew  by  what  means  they 
were  severally  dispatched." — [Thucydides:  IV. :  80. 

"The  magistrates  dispatched  privately  some  of  the  ablest  of  the 
young  men  into  the  country  from  time  to  time,  armed  only  with  their 
daggers,  and  taking  a  little  necessary  provision  with  them ;  in  the  day- 
time they  hid  themselves  in  out  of  the  way  places,  and  there  lay  close, 
but  in  the  night  issued  out  into  the  highways  and  killed  all  the  Helots 
they  could  light  upon :  sometimes  they  set  upon  them  by  day,  as  they 
were  at  work  in  the  fields,  and  murdered  them." — [Plutarch :  "  Lives  " ; 
Boston  ed.,  1859:  Vol.  1:  p.  120. 

LV. :  p.  158. — "  For  this  degraded  state  of  their  fellow-creatures  the 
Athenians  felt  no  greater  compassion  than  the  other  nations  of  antiq- 
uity. In  vain  we  seek  in  the  social  relations  of  the  Greeks  for  traces  of 
the  humanity  which  their  arts  and  their  philosophy  would  indicate  ; 
and  in  the  same  manner  that  their  treatment  of  the  female  sex  was, 
with  few  exceptions,  unworthy  and  degrading,  so  by  being  habituated 
to  slaves  from  early  youth,  they  had  lost  all  natural  feelings  of  sym- 
pathy toward  them." — [Boeckh  :  "Pub.  Econ.  of  Athens";  London 
ed.,1842:  pp.  657-8. 

After  the  defeat  of  Nicias,  it  was  agreed  by  the  Syracusans  "that 
the  servants  of  the  Athenians  with  the  other  confederates  be  sold  for 
slaves,  and  that  they  themselves  [^.  e.,  the  masters]  and  the  Sicilian 
auxiliaries,  be  kept  employed  in  the  quarries,  except  the  generals,  who 
should  be  put  to  death.  .  .  Most  of  the  Athenians  perished  in  the 
quarries,  by  disease  and  ill  diet,  being  allowed  only  one  pint  of  barley 
every  day,  and  one  half -pint  of  water.  Many  of  them,  however,  were 
carried  off  by  stealth,  or  from  the  first  were  supposed  to  be  servants, 
and  were  sold  as  slaves.  These  latter  were  branded  on  their  foi'eheada 
with  the  figure  of  a  horse."— [Plutarch:  "Lives";  Boston  ed.,  1859: 
Vol.  3:  pp.  827-9. 

In  the  same  way,  when  the  Samians  had  gained  the  victory  over  the 
Athenians  besieging  Samos,  they  branded  the  prisoners  in  their  fore- 
heads with  the  figure  of  an  owl,  in  requital  for  the  previous  action  of 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  485 

the  Athenians,  who  had  branded  Samian  prisoners  with  a  samaena,  oi 
the  figure  of  a  low  wide  ship.  It  is  supposed  that  Aristophanes  alludes 
to  this  when  he  speaks  of  the  Samians  as  'a  lettered  people.'— [Plu- 
tarch :  "  Lives  " ;  Boston  ed.,  1859 :  Vol.  1 :  p.  353.  Plautus  applies  the 
term  "  literatus  "  in  the  same  way :  "  Casina  " :  Act  II. :  sc.  6. 

LVI. :  p.  159. — "L.  OctacDius  Pilitus  is  said  to  have  been  a  slave, 
and,  after  the  ancient  fashion,  to  have  been  chained  to  the  door  as  a 
porter;  until,  having  been  freed,  on  account  of  his  genius  and  his  zeal 
for  learning,  he  drew  up  forms  of  accusation  for  his  patron,  who  was 
engaged  in  prosecuting  causes."  After  this,  this  liberated  slave  became 
a  Professor  of  Rhetoric,  was  a  teacher  of  Pompey  the  Great,  and  is  said 
to  have  been  the  first  freedman  who  ever  ventured  to  write  history. — 
[Suetonius  :  Clar.  Rhet. :  III. 

"But  now,  these  same  lands  [formerly  cultivated  by  generals  and 
senators]  slaves  cultivate,  whose  feet  are  chained,  the  hands  of  con- 
demned malefactors,  and  men  whose  faces  have  been  branded.  Yet, 
we  wonder  that  the  same  profits  are  not  realized  by  slaves  of  the  ergas- 
tula,  which  were  formerly  the  reward  of  generals." — [Pliny  :  Nat, 
Hist. :  XVIII. :  4. 

"As  to  the  housing  [of  slaves]  Columella  prescribed  ergros^itZa  svb- 
terranea,  in  which  openings  were  to  be  contrived  out  of  reach  of  the 
hand,  either  for  the  pui'pose  of  preventing  escape,  or  of  cutting  off  the 
sight  of  the  world,  which  was  denied  them.  Those  employed  at  the 
mill  carried  a  large  wheel  round  their  necks,  to  prevent  their  raising  to 
the  mouth  a  handful  of  the  flour  that  they  spent  the  day  in  grinding. 
This  deprives  the  Chinese  of  the  honor  of  having  invented  their  pecu- 
liar mode  of  torture,  and  it  was  the  mildest  method  of  treatment." — 
[Fred.  Ozanam  :  "Civilization  in  Fifth  Cent.";  London  ed.,  1867: 
Vol.  1  :  p.  150. 

' '  Slaves  are  in  the  power  of  their  proprietors,  a  power  recognized  by 
Gentile  law  [juris  Gentium],  for  all  nations  present  the  spectacle  of 
mastere  invested  with  power  of  life  and  death  over  slaves :  and  by  the 
Roman  law  the  owner  is  entitled  to  every  thing  acquired  by  the  slave.'* 
[Gains  :  Institut. :  I. :  §  52. 

"It  is  needless  to  describe  the  position  of  a  slave.  In  the  golden 
days  of  Greece  and  of  Rome  he  had  no  rights,  but  was  merely  subject  to 
duties.  He  was  a  vocale  instrumentum,  a  human  chattel,  or  a  tool  that 
speaks ;  and  in  contemplation  of  law,  he  in  no  degree  differed  from  a 
bullock.  .  .  He  could  acquire  no  property.  He  might,  without  any 
redress,  be  beaten,  or  sold,  or  put  to  death.  But  in  these  respects,  he 
was  not  in  a  worse  position  than  the  son  of  the  house." — [W.  E.  Heam? 
"Aryan  Household";  London  ed.,  1879  :  p.  107-8. 


486  APPENDIX. 

LVII. :  p.  159. — *' Not  long  after,  one  of  his  slaves  killed  Pedaniiu 
Secundus,  prefect  of  the  city.  .  .  Since,  according  to  the  ancient  cus- 
tom, it  was  proper  to  inflict  the  punishment  on  the  whole  family  of 
slaves  who  dwelt  under  the  same  roof,  by  the  concourse  of  the  people 
who  were  anxious  to  protect  so  many  Innocent  ones  matters  came  even 
to  a  seditious  riot,  and  in  the  Senate  itself  was  much  zeal  on  the  part  of 
those  contemning  such  excessive  severity."  [But  C.  Cassius  argued 
for  maintaining  the  ancient  custom;  and  in  spite  of  the  dissenting 
voices  of  those  who  commiserated  the  number,  the  age,  or  the  sex  of 
the  slaves,  and  the  unquestioned  innocence  of  many  of  them,  the  party 
prevailed  which  adjudged  all  to  death.]  .  .  "Then  the  emperor  re- 
buked the  people  in  an  edict,  and  guarded  with  lines  of  soldiers  all  the 
way  along  which  the  condemned  were  led  to  execution. " — [Tacitus  : 
Annal. :  Xiv. :  42-45. 

"A  decree  of  the  Senate  was  enacted  [under  Nero],  equally  for  fit 
retribution  and  for  security,  *  that  if  any  one  were  killed  by  his  own 
slaves,  those  also  who,  having  been  set  free  by  his  will,  had  still  re- 
mained imder  the  same  roof,  should  suffer  the  final  pim.ishment, 
among  his  other  slaves.'" — [Annal.:  xiil. :  32. 

LVin. :  p.  159. — "  You  may  perchance  be  so  great  a  person  that  you 
can  restrain  another's  anger,  as  the  divine  Augustus  did,  when  he  sup- 
ped ivitli  Vedius  Pollio.  One  of  his  [Pollio's]  slaves  had  broken  a 
crystal  vase ;  Vedius  commanded  him  to  be  carried  away,  and  to  be 
punished  by  no  common  death ;  for  he  ordered  him  to  be  thrown  to  his 
lampreys,  which  he  kept,  of  great  size,  in  a  fish-pond.  The  boy  es- 
caped out  of  their  hands,  and  fied  to  the  feet  of  the  emperor,  petition- 
ing for  nothing  but  that  he  might  die  in  some  other  way,  and  not  bo 
made  fish -meat.  Csesar  was  moved  by  the  novelty  of  the  cruelty ;  and 
commanded  that  he  be  dismissed  without  punishment,  but  that  all 
the  crystal  vessels  be  broken  in  his  presence,  and  that  the  fish-i^ond  bo 
filled  up." — [Seneca  :  De  Ira  :  ill. :  40. 

LIX. :  p.  159. — "Does  Rutilus  teach  a  gentle  temper,  and  a  habit  of 
life  undisturbed  by  slight  faults,  and  does  he  think  that  the  souls  and 
bodies  of  slaves  and  our  own  consist  of  like  matter  and  of  equivalent  ele- 
ments ?  Or  does  Rutilus  teach  men  to  rage  furiously,  who  rejoices  in 
the  harsh  roar  of  stripes,  and  compares  no  siren-song  to  that  of  the 
whips  ?  Then  is  he  happy,  as  often  as  some  one  is  being  branded  by 
the  torturer  with  the  burning  iron,  on  account  of  a  couple  of  napkins. 
What  does  he  recommend  to  his  son,  when  he  is  joyful  at  the  clank  of 
chains,  when  the  branded  [inscripta]  slave-gangs  marvellously  move 
him,  and  the  rustic  prison  ? " — [Juvenal  :  Sat.  xiv. :  15-25. 

"One  shiver's  the  rods  [broken  upon  him],  another  reddens  beneath 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  487 

the  blows  of  the  whip,  another  under  the  smaller  lash ;  there  are  some 
women  who  pay  an  annual  stipend  to  their  torturers.  The  man  lashes, 
and  she  by  way  of  passing  the  time  paints  her  face;  she  listens  to  hex 
female  friends,  or  considers  attentively  the  broad  gold  of  an  embroi- 
dered robe.  Still  he  cuts  away :  she  reads  over  the  criss-cross  items  of 
her  long  diary.  Yet  he  cuts,  until,  the  very  men  inflicting  the  stripes 
being  exhausted,  she  thunders  '  Get  Out ' !  in  a  horrible  voice,  the  exam- 
ination being  now  finished." — [Juvenal :  Sat.  vi. :  479-485. 

' ' '  Crucify  the  slave ' !  '  By  what  crime  has  the  slave  deserved  the 
punishment  ?  What  witness  appears  ?  Who  has  accused  him  ?  Hear 
me !  No  delay  is  ever  too  long,  when  the  death  of  a  man  is  involved ' ! 
*  O,  you  Fool !  Is  then  a  slave  a  man  ?  Suppose  he  has  done  nothing — 
let  it  be  so ;  I  will  it ;  I  command  it ;  let  my  will  stand  in  place  of  any 
reason!"— [Juvenal  :  Sat.  vi. :  218-223. 

Horace  says  that  people  in  their  senses  would  think  a  man  crazy 
who  should  have  a  slave  crucified  because  lie  had  helped  himself  to  a 
half -eaten  fish,  with  warm  sauce,  on  removing  it  from  the  table.  It 
would  not  be  punishing  the  man  according  to  the  nature  of  his  offence. 
But  the  power  to  do  even  this,  his  words  plainly  indicate  as  possible. — 
[Sat.  I.:  3:  80-84. 

LX. :  p.  159. — "There  is  an  old  matter  of  which  I  may  speak,  which 
by  reason  of  the  severity  of  the  example  it  presents  is  perhaps  unknown 
to  none  of  you : — that  when  an  immense  boar  was  brought  to  L.  Domi- 
tius,  then  praetor  in  Sicily,  he  asked  in  wonder,  who  had  killed  it  ?  that 
when  he  had  heard  it  was  somebody's  shepherd,  he  commanded  him  to 
be  called ;  that  the  man  came  eagerly  to  the  praetor,  looking  for  praise 
and  a  reward ;  that  Domitius  asked  him  how  he  had  killed  so  huge  a 
beast,  and  the  man  replied  '  with  a  hunting-spear ' ;  immediately,  then, 
by  command  of  the  praetor,  he  was  crucified.  This  may  perhaps  seem 
harsh ;  [Durum  hoc  f ortasse  videatur ;]  I  do  not  discuss  that,  on  either 
side ;  I  only  understand  that  Domitius  preferred  to  seem  cruel  in  pun- 
isliing,  rather  than  careless  in  overlooking." — [Cicero:  in  Verrem:  Act 
II.  V. :  3. 

Yet  of  Cicero,  so  discerning,  and  in  this  instance  certainly  so  un- 
biased, a  historical  critic  as  Cardinal  Newman  has  said,  not  extrava- 
gantly, that  "antiquity  may  be  challenged  to  produce  a  man  more 
virtuous,  or  more  perfectly  amiable,  than  Cicero." — ["Historical 
Sketches";  London  ed.,  1882:  Vol.  1:  p.  256. 

It  will  of  course  be  remembered  that  when,  in  the  same  oration, 
Cicero  has  occasion  to  speak  of  the  action  of  Verres,  praetor  in  the  same 
Sicily,  in  crucifying  Gavius,  a  citizen  of  Cosa,  the  orator  fijids  no 
words  to  do  justice  to  his  horror;  he  is  afraid  that  what  he  relates  will 
«eem  wholly  incredible ;  he  apostrophizes  in  despair  the  sweet  name 


4:88  APPENDIX. 

of  Liberty !  the  exalted  privilege  of  Citizenship !  '  It  is  a  crime, '  he  saya,. 
'  to  bind  a  Roman  citizen ;  a  wickedness  to  scourge  him ;  almost  a  parri- 
cide to  put  him  to  death.  What  shall  I  say  of  crucifying  him  ?  Sa 
nefarious  an  action  cannot  possibly  be  called  by  any  name  worthy 
of  its  wickedness.'  If  he  spoke  of  these  things  'not  to  men,  but  to^ 
brute  beasts,  or  even  in  some  most  desolate  wilderness,  to  stones  and 
rocks,  all  things  mute  and  inanimate  would  be  moved  by  such  shame 
ful  atrocity  of  conduct' ! — [61-67. 

This  measures  the  difference,  to  a  mind  like  Cicero's  and  to  those 
whom  he  addressed,  between  a  citizen  and  a  slave. 

LXI. :  p.  159. — "When  some  persons  exposed  their  sick  and  disabled 
slaves  on  the  island  of  JEsculapius,  because  of  the  slowness  of  their  re- 
covery, he  [Claudius]  established  it  as  an  inviolable  rule  that  all  who 
were  so  exposed  should  be  free,  not  to  return  to  the  authority  of  the 
master  if  they  should  regain  strength ;  and  that  if  any  chose  to  kill  a 
slave  outright,  rather  than  to  expose  him,  he  should  he  held  on  a  charge 
of  murder. " — [Suetonius :  ' '  Claudius  " :  xxv. 

LXII. :  p.  161. — "It  is  to  the  impulse  of  Stoical  and  Christian  ideas 
combined  that  we  must  attribute  the  Petronian  Law,  which  is  believed  to 
have  been  established  under  Nero,  and  which  forbade  masters  to  deliver 
their  slaves  to  combats  with  wild  beasts.  However,  this  was  only  the 
first  step.  It  attacked  only  one  of  the  thousand  means  by  which  the 
power  of  the  master  could  dispose  of  the  life  of  his  slave.  A  century- 
later,  the  Christian  reUgion  had  advanced;  it  had  aided  philosophy, 
and  ameHorated  Avith  it  the  harehness  of  men's  ruling  conceptions. 
Then  every  thing  changed  in  the  jurisprudence  aJffecting  the  relation 
of  slavery ;  the  right  of  appointing  life  or  death  was  transferred  to  the 
magistrates.  The  right  of  chastisement  still  left  to  the  master  was  com 
pelled  to  limit  itself  by  more  humane  regulations ;  a  magistrate,  the  city 
prefect,  was  charged  with  the  supervision  of  this  power." — [Troplong: 
"  De  I'lnfluence  du  Christianisme  " ;  Paris  ed.,  1868:  pp.  154-6. 

"But  in  the  present  day  neither  citizens  of  Rome,  nor  any  other  per- 
sons under  the  empire  of  the  Roman  people,  are  permitted  to  indulge 
in  excessive  or  causeless  harshness  toward  their  slaves.  By  a  consti- 
tution of  the  emperor  Pius  Antoninus,  a  man  who  kills  a  slave  of  whom 
be  is  owner,  is  as  liable  to  punishment  as  a  man  who  kills  a  slave  of 
whom  he  is  not  owner;  and  inordinate  cruelty  on  the  part  of  owners  is 
checked  by  another  constitution  whereby  the  same  emperor  .  .  com- 
manded that  on  proof  of  intolerable  cruelty  a  proprietor  should  be 
compelled  to  sell  his  slaves;  and  both  ordinances  are  just,  for  it  is 
proper  that  the  abuse  of  a  lawful  right  should  be  restrained." — [Gaius: 
Institut.:  1:  §53. 


NOTES  TO  LECTVRE  V.  489 

LXIII. :  p.  161. — "  This  statement  also  is  untrue,  that  it  is  '  onlj 
foohsh  and  low  individuals,  and  persons  devoid  of  perception,  and 
slaves,  and  women,  and  children,  of  whom  the  teachers  of  the  Divine 
word  wish  to  make  converts.'  Such,  indeed,  does  the  Gospel  invite, 
in  order  to  make  them  better,  but  it  invites  also  others  who  B.xe  very 
different  from  these,  since  Clirist  is  the  Saviour  of  all  men,  and  espe- 
cially of  them  that  believe,  whether  they  be  intelligent  or  simple."— 
rOrigen :  adv.  Celsus :  in. :  49. 

"And  let  the  master  love  his  servant,  although  he  be  his  superior. 
Let  him  consider  wherein  they  are  equal,  even  as  he  is  a  man.  And 
let  him  that  has  a  believing  master  love  him  both  as  a  master,  and  as 
of  the  same  faith,  and  as  a  father,  but  still  with  the  preservation  of  his 
authority  as  his  master.  .  .  In  like  manner,  let  a  master  who  has  a 
believing  servant  love  him  as  a  son,  or  as  a  brother,  on  account  of 
their  communion  in  the  faith,  but  still  preserving  the  difference  of  a 
servant." — [Apost.  Constitutions:  IV.:  12. 

By  the  same  "Apostolical  Constitutions  "  it  was  enjoined  that  slaves 
be  required  to  work  but  five  days  in  the  week,  *  having  leisure  on  the 
Sabbath-day  and  on  the  Lord's  day  to  go  to  the  church,  for  instruction 
in  piety.'  They  wftre  also  to  rest  from  work  *  all  the  great  week,  and 
that  which  follows  it,  m  memory  of  the  Passion  and  the  Eesurrection ' : 
on  Ascension-day,  at  Pentecost,  at  Christmas,  on  the  day  of  the  Epiph- 
any, on  the  days  of  the  Apostles,  on  the  day  of  the  Martyr  Stephen, 
and  on  the  days  which  commemorated  other  holy  martyi'S. — [VIII. :  33. 

"  Some  one  will  say,  Are  there  not  among  you  some  poor,  and  othei'S 
rich  ?  Some  servants,  and  others  masters  ?  Is  there  not  a  difference 
between  individuals  ?  There  is  none ;  nor  is  there  any  other  causa 
why  we  mutually  bestow  upon  each  other  the  name  of  brethren,  ex- 
cept that  we  believe  ourselves  to  be  equal.  For  since  we  measure  all 
human  beings  not  by  the  body,  but  by  the  spirit,  although  the  condi- 
tion of  bodies  is  different,  yet  we  have  no  servants,  but  we  both  regard 
and  speak  of  them  as  brothers  in  spirit,  in  religion  as  fellow-servants. 
.  .  Though  in  lowliness  of  mind  we  are  on  an  equality,  the  free  with 
the  slaves,  the  rich  with  the  poor,  yet  in  the  sight  of  God  we  ai'e  dis- 
tinguislied  by  virtue.  And  every  one  is  more  elevated  in  proportion 
to  his  greater  righteousness." — [Lactantius:  Div.  Inst.:  V.:  16. 

"  Yet  for  her  good  discipline  was  she  [Monnica]  wont  to  commend 
not  so  much  her  mother's  diligence,  as  that  of  a  certain  decrepit  maid- 
servant, who  had  carried  her  father  when  a  child,  as  little  ones  used  to 
be  canied  at  the  backs  of  elder  girls.  For  wliich  reason,  and  for  her 
great  age,  and  excellent  convei'sation,  was  she,  in  that  Christian  family, 
well  respected  by  its  heads.  Whence  also  the  charge  of  her  master's 
daughters  was  entrusted  to  her,  to  which  she  gave  diligent  heed,  re- 
straining them  earnestly,  when  necessary  with  a  holy  severity,  and 


490  APPENBIJ. 

teaching  them  with  a  grave  discretion." — [Augustine:  *'  Confessions  " ; 
IX.:  17. 

LXIV. :  p.  162. — "  The  ransoming  of  captives  is  a  great  and  noble 
exercise  of  justice  ;  of  which  the  same  Tullius  also  approved.  *  And 
this  liberality,'  he  says,  *  is  serviceable  even  to  the  state,  that  captives 
should  be  ransomed  from  slavery,  and  those  of  slender  resources  be 
provided  for.  .  .  This  is  the  part  of  great  and  eminent  men.'  .  . 
Some  will  perhaps  say.  If  I  shall  do  all  these  things,  I  shall  have  no 
possessions.  .  .  Devote  to  the  ransoming  of  captives  that  from  which 
you  purchase  beasts ;  maintain  the  poor  with  that  from  which  you 
feed  wild  beasts  ;  bury  the  innocent  dead  with  that  from  which  you 
provide  men  for  the  sword.  .  .  God,  who  produces  and  gives  breath 
to  men,  willed  that  all  should  be  equal,  that  is,  equally  matched.  He 
has  promised  Immortality  to  all :  no  one  is  cut  off  from  His  heavenly 
benefits.  .  .  In  His  sight,  no  one  is  a  slave,  no  one  a  master  ;  for  if 
all  have  the  same  Father,  by  an  equal  right  we  ai'e  all  children." — 
[Lactantius:  Div.  Inst:  VI.:  13;  V.:  15. 

"  His  last  words  [of  Ephrem,  of  Edessa]  were  a  protest  in  favour  of 
the  dignity  of  man  redeemed  by  the  Son  of  God.  The  young  and 
pious  daughter  of  the  governor  of  Edessa  having  come  in  tears  to  re- 
ceive his  last  sigh,  he  made  her  swear  on  his  death-bed  to  use  no  longer 
a  litter  carried  by  slaves,  because  the  apostle  has  said,  '  The  head  of 
man  should  bear  no  yoke  but  that  of  Christ.'" — [Montalembert : 
"Monks  of  the  West";  London  ed.,  1861:  Vol.  1:  pp.  341-2. 

LXV. :  p.  162. — "  We  further  beseech  Thee  for  this  city,  and  its  in- 
habitants ;  for  those  that  are  sick  ;  for  those  in  bitter  servitude  ;  for 
those  in  banishment ;  for  those  in  prison  ;  that  Thou  the  helper  and 
assister  of  all  men,  wilt  be  their  supporter.  .  .  And  let  all  the  people 
say.  Amen  ! "— [Apost.  Constit. :  VIII. :  12. 

"The  bishop  ought  to  know  whose  oblations  he  ought  to  receive, 
and  whose  he  ought  not.  Those  that  oppress  the  widow,  and  overbear 
the  orphan,  and  fill  prisons  with  the  innocent,  and  abuse  their  own 
servants  wickedly,  I  mean  with  stripes,  and  hunger,  and  hard  service, — 
do  thou,  0  bishop,  avoid  such  as  these,  and  their  odious  oblations.  .  . 
For  they  that  receive  from  such  persons,  and  thereby  support  the 
widows  and  the  orphans,  shall  be  obnoxious  to  the  Judgment-seat  of 
God."— [Apost.  Constit. :  IV. :  6. 

LXVI. :  p.  162. — "  Slavery  is  nothing  but  a  name.  The  mastership 
is  according  to  the  flesh,  temporary  and  brief,  for  whatever  is  of  the 
flesh  is  perishable.  .  .  He  [the  slave]  is  a  brother,  or  rather  he  has 
become  a  brother,  he  enjoys  the  same  privileges,  he  belongs  to  the 


NOTES  TO  LECTUBE  V.  491 

same  body.  He  hath  become  the  brother,  not  of  his  own  n^aster  only, 
but  also  of  the  Son  of  God.  .  .  If  any  one  shall  ask,  whence  slavery 
comes,  and  why  it  has  found  entrance  into  human  life,  I  will  tell  you : 
Covetousness  begat  slavery,  and  an  evil  temper,  and  insatiable  greedi- 
ness. For  Noah  had  no  servant,  neither  had  Abel,  nor  Seth,  no,  nor 
they  who  came  after  them.  The  thing  was  the  fruit  of  sin,  of  rebel- 
lion against  parents." — [Chrysostom:  Hom.  on  Ep.  ad  Ephes. :  xxii. ; 
Opera:  Venice,  1741:  Tom.  XI.:  pp.  165-7. 

' '  When  your  master  commands  nothing  which  is  unpleasing  to 
God,  it  is  right  to  follow  and  obey ;  but  no  farther.  For  thus  the 
slave  becomes  free.  If  you  go  farther,  even  though  you  may  be  free, 
you  are  become  a  slave.  .  .  It  is  not  slavery  itself  that  injures.  Beloved, 
but  the  slavery  of  sin,  which  is  the  veritable  bondage.  If  thou  art  not 
subjected  to  this  slavery,  be  bold  and  rejoice ;  no  one  shall  have  power 
to  do  thee  harm,  so  that  thou  hast  the  temper  which  is  free  of  all 
bondage."— [Chiysostom  :  Hom.  on  1st  Corinth. :  xix. ;  Opera:  Tom. 
X. :  p.  165. 

LXVII. :  p.  162. — "  Some  teachers,  as  Isidore  of  Pelusium  in  the  fifth 
century,  and  Theodore  the  Studite  in  the  ninth,  altogether  questioned, 
or  even  denied,  the  lawfulness  of  having  such  property.  Theodore,  in 
his  will,  forbids  the  abbot  of  his  monastery  to  have  slaves,  since  the  use 
of  them  is  allowed  to  secular  persons  only.  But  the  reason  which  he 
gives — that  they  are  men,  made  in  God's  image — would  hold  equally 
against  all  slavery  whatever.  .  .  The  foiu^th  council  of  Toledo  (a.d. 
633)  requires  that  serfs  ordained  to  be  clergymen  should  be  emancipated ; 
but  it  was  not  until  the  year  817,  in  the  reign  of  Louis  the  Pious,  that 
a  similar  law  was  established  in  France.  Justinian  had  forbidden  that 
slaves  should  be  ordained,  even  with  the  leave  of  their  masters ;  but 
afterwards  ordination  itself  emancipated." — [Eobertson:  "  Hist,  of  the 
Church";  London  ed.,  1875:  Vol.  III.:  pp.  263,  266,  and  notes. 

Pope  Calixtus  I.  had  been  a  slave ;  and  while  Hippolytus  vehemently 
assailed  both  his  opinions  and  his  character,  he  made  no  invidious  com- 
ment  upon  his  early  servile  condition. — [See  "Eefut.  of  Heresies": 
IX.:  7. 

LXVIII. :  p.  162. — The  deed  drawn  up  by  Gregory  for  this  purpose 
i£  introduced  with  these  words :  "  Since  our  Saviour,  the  founder  of  all 
created  things,  was  willing  to  take  upon  Him  the  nature  of  man  for  its 
propitiation,  that  by  the  grace  of  His  divinity,  the  chains  of  bondage 
in  which  we  were  enthi-alled  being  broken.  He  might  restore  us  to  our 
original  freedom, — so  a  salutary  thing  is  done  when  men  whom  nature 
from  the  beginning  produced  as  free,  and  whom  the  law  of  the  nations 
has  subjected  to  the  yoke  of  servitude,  are  restored  again  by  the  blesS" 
ing  of  emancipation  to  the  freedom  in  which  they  were  bom." 


492  APPENDIJ^. 

The  original  may  be  found  quoted  in  Robertson's  "  Hist,  of  Cbarlen 
Fifth";  Boston  ed.,  1857:  Vol.  1:  pp.  297-8. 

Many  other  charters  of  emancipation  are  referred  to  in  the  same  con- 
nection, purporting  to  be  granted:  'for  the  love  of  Grod';  'for  the 
health  of  the  soul ' ;  'for  the  ransom  of  the  soul ' ;  'for  reverence  to- 
ward Almighty  God,'  etc.  Freedom  was  often  granted  to  slaves  as  a 
testimony  of  gratitude  to  God  for  the  birth  of  a  son,  or  any  other  great 
benefit.  The  form  of  manumission  was  executed  in  a  church,  as  a  re- 
ligious solemnity.  And  any  slave  taking  the  vow  in  a  monastery,  or 
entering  holy  orders,  obtained  liberty  thereby. 

"The  eleventh  and  twelfth  centuries  saw  the  number  of  slaves  in 
Italy  begin  to  decrease ;  early  in  the  fifteenth,  a  writer  quoted  by  Mu- 
ratori  speaks  of  them  as  no  longer  existing.  The  greater  part  of  the 
peasants  in  some  countries  of  Germany  had  acquired  their  liberty  before 
the  end  of  the  thirteenth  century;  in  other  parts,  as  well  as  in  all  tho 
northern  and  eastern  parts  of  Europe,  they  remained  in  a  sort  of  villen- 
age  till  the  present  age." — [HaUam:  "Middle  Ages";  London  ed., 
1853:  Vol.  1:  pp.  200-201. 

LXIX. :  p.  163. — "Doubtless  the  condition  of  the  servile  class  was 
ameliorated  by  the  legislation  of  good  Pagan  emperors ;  and  not  only 
the  precepts  of  Seneca,  but  the  edicts  of  Hadrian,  Trajan,  and  Anto- 
ninus attest  the  growth  of  just  and  himaane  sentiments.  But  the 
steady  agency  of  Christianity  availed  incomparably  more  than  the 
happy  accident  of  wisdom  and  virtue  in  a  prince.  All  its  ordinances 
were  open  indiscriminately  to  bond  and  free ;  nor  was  servile  birth  any 
disqualification  for  the  discharge  of  Church-functions, — from  the  hum- 
ble ofiice  of  the  two  slave-girls  mentioned  in  Pliny's  letter  to  Trajan, 
to  the  dignity  of  the  Episcopate  itself.  This  rule  stands  in  strong  con- 
trast with  the  Roman  law,  according  to  which  no  public  ofiice  could 
be  held  by  a  slave.  .  .  .  An  indication  of  the  direction  which  was 
assumed  by  the  sympathies  of  the  new  religion  is  afforded  by  the  fact, 
that,  from  the  time  of  Constantine,  the  process  of  manumission  was  for 
the  most  part  transferred  to  the  Church,  and  formed  part  of  the  cere- 
monies at  Easter,  and  the  other  ecclesiastical  festivals.  And  under  the 
auspices  of  Christian  emperors,  the  facilities  for  manumission  were  so 
greatly  increased,  that,  after  the  impediments  removed  by  Justinian, 
freedom  became  the  rule,  and  slavery  the  exception,  among  the  poorer 
subjects  of  the  empire." — [James  Martineau:  "Miscellanies";  Boston 
ed.,  1852:  pp.  274-6. 

"  Coming  in  the  name  of  one  '  despised  and  rejected  of  men ';  of  a 
man  bom  in  an  ox's  crib,  at  his  best  estate  not  having  where  to  lay  his 
head ;  who  died  at  the  hangman's  hand,  but  who  was  at  last  seated  al 
the  right  hand  of  God,  and  in  his  low  estate  was  deemed  God  in  hu 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  493 

miliation  come  down  into  the  flesh,  to  take  its  humblest  form,  and  show 
he  was  no  respecter  of  persons, — the  Church  did  not  fail  to  espouse  the 
cause  of  the  people,  with  whom  Christianity  found  its  first  adherents, 
its  apostles  and  defenders.  .  .  It  came  to  the  Baron,  haughty  of  soul, 
and  bloody  of  hand,  who  sat  in  his  cliff -tower,  as  a  hungry  raven ;  who 
broke  the  poor  into  fragments,  ground  them  to  powder,  and  spumed 
them  like  dust  from  his  foot ;  it  came  between  him  and  the  captive,  the 
serf,  the  slave,  the  defenceless  maiden,  and  stayed  the  insatiate  hand. 
Its  curse  blasted  as  lightning.  .  .  Then,  while  nothing  but  the  acci- 
dent of  distinguished  birth,  or  the  possession  of  animal  fierceness,  could 
save  a  man  from  the  collar  of  the  thrall,  the  Church  took  to  her  bosom 
all  who  gave  signs  of  talent  and  piety ;  sheltered  them  in  her  monas- 
teries ;  ordained  them  as  her  priests ;  welcomed  them  to  the  chair  of  St. 
Peter ;  and  men  who  from  birth  would  have  been  companions  of  tho 
Galilean  fishermen,  sat  on  the  spiritual  throne  of  the  world,  and  gov- 
erned with  a  majesty  which  Caesar  might  envy  but  could  not  equal." — 
[Theodore  Parker:  *' Discourse  of  E6ligion":  pp.  422-4;  Boston  ed., 
1843. 

LXX. :  p.  164. — *'If  we  shall  suppose  that  American  Slavery  is  one 
of  those  offences  which,  in  the  providence  of  God,  must  needs  come, 
but  which,  having  continued  through  His  appointed  time,  He  now  wills 
to  remove,  and  that  He  gives  to  both  North  and  South  this  terrible 
war,  as  the  woe  due  to  those  by  whom  the  offence  came,  shall  we  dis- 
cern therein  any  departure  from  those  divine  attributes  which  the  be- 
lievers in  a  living  God  always  ascribe  to  Him  ?  Fondly  do  we  hope, 
fervently  do  we  pray,  that  this  mighty  scourge  of  war  may  speedily 
pass  away.  Yet,  if  God  wills  that  it  continue  until  all  the  wealth  piled 
by  the  bondman's  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  of  unrequited  toil  shall 
be  sunk,  and  until  every  drop  of  blood  drawn  with  the  lash  shall  be 
paid  by  another  drawn  with  the  sword, — as  was  said  three  thousand 
years  ago,  so  still  it  must  be  said,  '  The  judgments  of  the  Lord  are  true 
and  righteous  altogether.'" — [President  Lincoln:  Second  Inaugural 
Address,  1865. 

LXXL :  p.  164. — The  words  of  Plautus  are:  "Lupus  est  homo 
homini,  non  homo:  quum  qualis  sit  non  novit." — ['*  Asinariae":  Act 
IL:  Sc.  4:  88. 

Really,  however,  he  probably  does  little  more  than  quote,  and 
slightly  amplify,  a  current  proverb,  of  the  same  tenor. 

"  Wherefore  the  legislator  may  safely  make  a  law  applicable  to  such 
cases,  in  the  following  terms :  Let  there  be  no  beggars  in  our  state  ; 
and  if  anybody  begs,  seeking  to  collect  the  means  of  life  by  perpetual 
prayers,  let  the  wardens  of  the  agora  turn  him  out  of  the  agora,  and 


494  APPENDIX. 

the  wardens  of  the  city  out  of  the  city,  and  the  wardens  of  tlie  country 
send  him  out  of  any  other  part  of  the  country  over  the  border,  thai 
so  the  country  may  be  cleared  of  that  sort  of  animal." — [Plato: 
''Laws";  xi. :  936. 

LXXII. :  p.  165. — "If  a  poor  man,  or  one  of  a  mean  family,  or  a 
stranger,  comes  among  you,  whether  he  be  old  or  young,  and  there  "be 
no  place,  the  deacon  shall  find  a  place  for  even  these,  and  that  with  all 
his  heart :  that,  instead  of  accepting  persons  before  men,  his  ministra- 
tion toward  God  may  be  well  pleasing.  The  very  same  thing  let  the 
deaconess  do  to  those  women,  whether  poor  or  rich,  that  come  unto 
them." — [Apost.  Constitut. ;  n. :  58. 

LXXIII. :  p.  166. — The  folly  of  expecting  beneficent  changes  in  so- 
ciety, except  as  the  result  of  wide  preparatory  changes  in  individual 
character,  is  well  expressed  in  these  words  of  Herbert  Spencer : — 

"Just  as  the  perpetual-motion  schemer  hopes,  by  a  cunning  arrange- 
ment of  parts,  to  get  from  one  end  of  his  machine  more  energy  than  he 
puts  in  at  the  other :  so  the  ordinary  political  schemer  is  convinced  that 
out  of  a  legislative  apparatus,  properly  devised  and  worked  with  due 
dexterity,  may  be  had  beneficial  State-action,  without  any  detrimental 
reaction.  He  expects  to  get  out  of  a  stupid  people  the  effects  of  intelli- 
gence, and  to  evolve  from  inferior  citizens  superior  conduct." — ["Study 
of  Sociology  " :  New  York  ed.,  1880:  p.  6. 

"  Certainly  it  is  because  the  French  people  have  not  united  religion 
with  liberty,  that  then'  revolution  has  so  soon  departed  from  its  early 
direction.  It  may  be  that  certain  dogmas  of  the  Catholic  Church  did 
not  accord  with  the  principles  of  Liberty :  that  passive  obedience  to  the 
Pope  was  as  little  supportable  as  was  such  obedience  to  the  Kmg.  But 
Christianity  has  in  very  deed  brought  liberty  upon  the  earth :  justice 
toward  the  oppressed:  respect  for  the  unfortunate:  in  a  word,  that 
equality  before  God,  of  which  equality  before  the  law  is  only  an  im- 
perfect image." — [Mad.  de  Stael:  "Considerations  sui*  la  Eev.  Fran- 
^aise";  CEuvres:  Tom.  m. :  pp.  379-80. 

LXXIV. :  p.  166. — It  is  impossible,  of  coui^e,  to  break  this  picture 
mto  its  parts  without  injury ;  but  these  are  some  of  the  characteristics 
which  Aristotle  ascribes  to  the  magnanimous  man : — to  estimate  his  own 
worth  highly;  to  be  a  man  great  in  virtue,  of  a  finished  excellence; 
to  be  principally  concerned  about  honors,  not  about  wealth  or  pleasure, 
though  this  may  give  him  the  appearance  of  superciliousness :  to  feel  a 
just  contempt  for  those  of  mean  opinions  or  actions ;  not  to  shun  dan- 
ger, while  not  being  fond  of  it;  to  be  disposed  to  bestow  benefits,  but 
ashamed  to  receive  them ;  to  ask  no  favors,  but  to  be  willing  to  serve 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  V.  495 

others ;  toward  men  of  rank  or  foi'tune  to  be  haughty  in  demeanor, 
but  toward  those  of  middle  station  moderate ;  to  be  inclined  to  do  few 
things,  but  those  great  and  distinguished ;  to  care  more  for  truth  than 
for  opinion  ;  to  be  frank  and  bold  in  action  and  speech,  though  to  the 
vulgar  he  may  dissemble ;  not  to  be  much  given  to  admiration,  since 
nothing  is  great  to  him  ;  to  be  not  mindful  of  injuries,  and  not 
much  disposed  to  praise  men ;  to  be  of  a  slow  step,  a  deep  voice,  stately 
in  speech,  and  not  anxious  about  anything." — [Nic.  Ethics:  IV. :  3. 

LXXV. :  p.  167. — On  the  command  'Love  God  above  everything, 
and  thy  neighbour  as  thyself,'  Kant  in  the  Critique  of  the  Practical 
Eeason,  adds  the  terse  comment,  in  a  note:  "This  law  is  in  striking 
contrast  with  the  principle  of  private  happiness,  which  some  make  the 
supreme  principle  of  morality.  That  would  be  expressed  thus  :  '  Love 
thyself  above  everything,  and  God  and  thy  neighbour  for  thine  own 
sake'"  !— [See  Abbott's  trans. :  London  ed.,  1879:  p.  250. 

LXXVI. :  p.  167. — "Besides  all  this,  the  Church  was  the  great  popu- 
lar institution  of  the  Middle  Ages,  cheering  and  protecting  the  poor 
and  friendless ;  the  teacher,  the  healer,  the  feeder  of  the  '  little  people 
of  God. '  The  services  of  monastic  and  secular  clergy  alike,  their  offices 
of  faith,  charity,  and  labor  in  the  field  and  the  hovel,  in  the  school 
and  the  hospital,  as  well  as  in  the  church,  were  for  centuries  the  chief 
witnesses  of  the  spirit  of  human  brotherhood,  and  of  the  one  essential 
doctrine  of  Christianity.  In  times  when  lord  and  serf  were  farthest 
apart,  when  the  villain  had  no  rights  but  those  of  the  beasts  which  per- 
ish, the  Church  read  the  parable  of  Dives  and  Lazarus,  and  declared 
the  equality  of  man  in  the  presence  of  God." — [Charles  E.  Norton: 
"Studies  of  Church-Building":  New  York  ed.,  1880:  p.  15. 

LXXVII. :  p.  167. — "It  sometimes  happens  that  the  character  of  a 
man,  and  the  peculiarity  of  his  elevation,  attract  the  attention  of  pos- 
terity more  than  do  the  memorable  actions  of  others.  The  dispropor- 
tion which  one  notices  between  the  birth  of  Sixtus  V.,  son  of  a  poor 
vine-dresser,  and  his  exaltation  to  the  supreme  dignity,  augments  his 
reputation ;  though  we  have  already  seen  that  obscure  and  mean  birth 
was  never  regarded  as  an  obstacle  to  the  highest  pontifical  station,  under 
a  religion  and  in  a  court  where  high  places  were  reputed  prizes  of  mer- 
it, though  they  may  also  have  been  prizes  of  intrigue.  Pius  V.  was  of 
a  family  hardly  higher.  Adrian  VI.  was  the  son  of  a  mechanic. 
Nicolas  V.  was  born  in  obscurity.  The  father  of  the  famous  John 
XXII. ,  who  added  a  third  circle  to  the  tiara,  and  wore  three  crowns 
without  possessing  an  acre  of  land,  mended  shoes  at  Cahors.  This  waa 
the  trade  also  of  the  father  of  Urban  IV.   Adrian  IV.,  one  of  the  great- 


4:96  APPENDIX. 

est  of  the  Popes,  son  of  a  beggar,  had  been  a  beggar  himself.  The  his- 
tory of  the  church  is  full  of  such  examples,  which  encourage  simple 
virtue,  and  confound  human  vanity.  .  .  Perhaps  the  man  who  in  the 
rude  times  which  we  call  the  Middle  Age  deserved  best  of  the  human 
race,  was  the  Pope  Alexander  Third.  He  it  was  who,  in  a  council  ol' 
the  twelfth  century,  as  far  as  was  possible  for  him,  abolished  slavery. 
.  .  He  revived  the  rights  of  the  people,  and  restrained  the  wickedness 
of  kings.  We  have  remarked  that  before  that  time  the  whole  ol 
Europe,  excepting  a  few  cities,  was  portioned  out  between  two  sorts  ol 
men :  the  lords  of  the  land,  whether  secular  or  ecclesiastical,  and  slaves. 
If  men  were  restored  to  their  rights,  it  was  principally  to  the  Pope 
Alexander  Third  that  they  were  indebted  for  them." — [Voltaire: 
"EssaisurlesMoeurs":  184,197;  CEuvres:  Paris  ed.,  1877:  Tom.IIL: 
pp.  571,  606-7. 

LXXVIII. :  p.  167.— "A  contemporary  of  St.  Hugh  of  Cluny,  abbot 
William  of  Hirschau,  the  great  light  of  monastic  Germany  in  the 
eleventh  century,  occupied  himself  with  anxious  care  in  comforting 
the  needy,  visiting  them  in  their  cottages,  and  himself  performing  their 
humble  funerals.  He  labored,  above  all,  for  the  cure  of  the  insane 
poor,  using  spiritual  means  for  this  end,  even  in  the  midst  of  the  pix> 
longed  contest  which  he  was  forced  to  maintain  against  the  Imperial- 
ists, for  the  independence  of  the  church.  .  .  It  is  to  the  monks  that 
Europe  owes  the  first  hospitals  and  lazar-houses  that  are  known.  Id 
his  enthusiasm  for  the  immense  hospital  created  by  St.  Basil  at  Cesarea, 
St.  Gregory  Nazianzen  gave  that  town  the  glorious  title  of  the  City  of 
Charity,  and  placed  it  above  the  seven  wonders  of  the  ancient  world. 
.  .  The  city  of  Copenhagen  owes  its  origin  to  a  monastery  founded  by 
Abp.  Absolon,  on  the  Baltic  coast,  for  the  reception  of  the  shipwrecked." 
— [Montalembert  :  ''Monks  of  the  West";  London  ed.,  1879  :  Vol.  6  : 
pp.  283,  285,  291. 

"When  the  hideous  disease  of  leprosy  extended  its  ravages  over 
Europe,  when  the  minds  of  men  were  filled  with  terror,  not  only  by 
its  loathsomeness  and  its  contagion,  but  also  by  the  notion  that  it  was 
in  a  peculiar  sense  supernatural,  new  hospitals  and  refuges  overspread 
Europe,  and  monks  flocked  in  multitudes  to  serve  in  them.  .  .  Surely 
no  achievements  of  the  Christian  Church  are  more  truly  great  than 
these  which  it  has  effected  in  the  sphere  of  charity.  For  the  first  time 
in  the  history  of  mankind,  it  has  inspired  many  thousands  of  men  and 
women,  at  the  sacrifice  of  all  worldly  interests,  and  often  under  cir- 
cumstances of  extreme  discomfort  or  danger,  to  devote  their  entire  lives 
to  the  single  object  of  assuaging  the  sufferings  of  humanity.  It  has 
covered  the  globe  with  countless  institutions  of  mercy,  absolutely  un- 
known to  the  Pagan  world.   .   .   A  monk,  filled  with  compassion  at  the 


NOT^JS  TO  LECTURE  V.  497 

sight  of  the  maniacs  who  were  hooted  by  crowds  through  tlie  streets  of 
Valencia,  founded  an  asylum  in  that  city  [a.d.  1409],  and  his  example 
was  speedily  followed  in  other  provinces.  In  a.d.  1425,  an  asylum  was 
erected  at  Saragossa.  In  a.d.  1436,  both  Seville  and  Yalladolid  fol 
lowed  the  example,  as  did  also  Toledo,  in  a.d.  1488." — [Lecky  :  "Hist 
of  European  Morals";  New  York  ed.,  1876  :  Vol.  2  :  pp.  89-91,  95. 

LXXIX. :  p.  169. — The  difficult  progress  of  Christian  society  is  well 
illustrated  in  the  words  of  Coleridge : — 

"By  the  happy  organization  of  a  well-governed  society  the  contra- 
dictory interests  of  ten  millions  of  such  individuals  may  neutralize  each 
other,  and  be  reconciled  in  the  unity  of  the  national  interest.  But 
whence  did  this  happy  organization  first  come  ?  Was  it  a  tree  trans- 
planted from  Paradise,  with  all  its  branches  in  full  fruitage  ?  Or  was 
it  sowed  in  sunshine  ?  Was  it  in  vernal  breezes  and  gentle  rains  that 
it  fixed  its  roots,  and  grew  and  strengthened  ?  Let  history  answer 
these  questions.  With  blood  was  it  planted;  it  was  rocked  in  tempest; 
the  goat,  the  ass,  and  the  stag  gnawed  it ;  the  wild  boar  has  whetted 
his  tusks  on  its  bark.  The  deep  scars  are  still  extant  on  its  trimk,  and 
the  path  of  the  lightning  may  be  traced  among  its  higher  branches. 
And  even  after  its  full  growth,  in  the  season  of  its  strength,  when  its 
height  reached  to  the  heaven,  and  the  sight  thereof  to  all  the  earth, 
the  whirlwind  has  more  than  once  forced  its  stately  top  to  touch  the 
ground.  It  has  been  bent  like  a  bow,  and  it  sprang  back  like  a  shaft. 
Mightier  powers  were  at  work  than  expediency  ever  yet  called  up ;  yea, 
mightier  than  the  mere  imderstanding  can  comprehend." — [Coleridge: 
Works;  New  York  ed.,  1853  :  Vol.  1  :  p.  432. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI. 

Note  I. :  page  174. — "  According  to  the  ancient  theory  of  war,  the 
captor  in  liis  treatment  of  the  captive  was  not  hound  by  any  rule  of 
right ;  the  relation  between  them  was  one  of  mere  force :  if  that  force 
was  used  to  take  his  life,  the  captive  could  not  complain  of  a  rigou 
which  in  the  opposite  case  he  might  himself  have  exercised.  If  he  re- 
ceived life,  even  under  the  conditions  of  slavery,  it  was  more  than  he 
was  entitled  to  claim." — [Hadley:  "Introd.  to  Roman  Law";  New 
Yorked.,  1880:  p.  110. 

Even  his  humane  and  accomplished  hero,  Cyrus,  is  represented  by 
Xenophon  as  again  and  again  saying  to  his  soldiers:  "  The  conflict  is 
at  hand,  for  the  enemies  are  approaching:  the  prizes  of  victory,  if  we 
conquer,  are  our  enemies  themselves,  and  their  possessions ;  and  so,  on 
the  other  hand,  if  we  are  conquered,  the  property  of  the  conquered 
stands  exposed  as  the  reward  of  the  conquerors.  .  .  You  ought  to  be 
sensible  that  there  is  nothing  more  gainful  than  victory ;  for  the  victor 
possesses  himself  of  everything  at  once,  men,  women,  treasure,  and  the 
whole  country.  .  .  It  is  a  perpetual  law  among  all  men  that  when  a 
city  is  taken  from  an  enemy  both  the  persons  and  the  property  of  the 
inhabitants  belong  to  the  captors." — [Oyropaedia:  11.:  3:  §2;  IV.:  2: 
^2Q',  VII.:  5:  §73. 

II. :  p.  174. — "  Nicias  and  Demosthenes  they  [the  Syracusans]  put  to 
the  sword,  although  against  the  will  of  Gylippus.  For  Gylippus 
thought  that  to  carry  home  with  him  to  Lacedaemon  the  generals  of 
the  enemy,  over  and  above  all  his  other  successes,  would  be  a  brilliant 
triumph.  .  .  No  one  of  the  Hellenes  in  my  time  was  less  deserving 
[than  Nicias]  of  so  miserable  an  end:  for  he  lived  in  the  practice  of 
every  virtue." — [Thucydides:  vil. :  86. 

Niebuhr,  in  his  Lectures  on  Roman  History  (Lect.  LVI.),  following 
Palmerius  and  Beaufort,  discredits  the  story  of  the  death  of  Regulus 
by  barbarous  tortures  at  Carthage,  principally  on  the  ground  of  Po- 
lybius'  silence  about  it.  But  the  general  modem  opinion  accepts  the 
statement  of  the  ancient  authorities. 

in. :  p.  175. — At  Cannae,  forty  thousand  foot  soldiers,  two  thousand 
seven  hundred  cavalry,  are  said  to  have  been  slain,  of  Romans  and 
^498) 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VL  499 

their  allies,  with  quaestors,  military  tribunes,  eighty  senatorial  men, 
and  a  consul.  One  Numidian  is  mentioned,  who,  unable  to  reach  hia 
weapon,  had  died  tearing  his  antagonist  with  his  teeth. — [Livy :  Histor. ; 
XXII. :  49,  51. 

In  regard  to  the  Samnites  it  is  said :  ' '  They  [the  Eomans]  slew,  with- 
out  distinction,  those  who  resisted,  and  those  who  fled,  the  armed  and 
unarmed,  slaves  and  freemen,  young  and  Oxd,  men  and  cattle.  Noi 
would  a  single  animal  have  survived,  had  not  the  consuls  given  the  sig- 
nal for  retreat,  and,  by  commands  and  threats,  forced  out  of  the  camp 
the  soldiers  greedy  of  slaughter."  The  consuls  immediately  explained 
to  the  indignant  soldiers  that  they  had  stayed  the  slaughter  only  in 
consideration  of  six  hundred  Eomau  youth  confined  at  Luceria,  as 
hostages,  on  whom  the  enemy,  if  driven  to  utter  despair,  would  take 
vengeance. — [Livy:  Histor.;  ix. :  14. 

When  Mel  OS  was  invested  by  the  Athenians,  Thucydides  reports 
that  there  was  treachery  among  its  citizens.  "So  the  Melians  were  in- 
duced to  sm-render  at  discretion.  The  Athenians  thereupon  put  to 
death  all  who  were  of  military  age,  and  made  slaves  of  the  women 
and  children.  They  then  colonized  the  island,  by  sending  thither  five 
hundred  settlers  of  their  own." — [V. :  116. 

When  the  fortified  camp  of  the  Persians  was  taken,  after  the  battle 
of  Plataea,  Herodotus  says  that  '  the  barbarians  no  longer  kept  to- 
gether, or  in  any  array,  nor  thought  of  making  further  resistance ' : 
and  he  adds,  "  With  such  tameness  did  they  submit  to  be  slaughtered 
by  the  Greeks,  that  of  the  three  hundred  thousand  men  who  composed 
the  army — omitting  the  forty  thousand  by  whom  Artabazus  was  ac 
companied  in  his  flight — no  more  than  three  thousand  outlived  the 
battle."— [IX. :  70. 

"Caesar  distributed  the  impatient  legions  into  four  wedge-shaped  di- 
visions, that  the  devastation  might  be  a  wider  one  :  he  wasted  a  space 
of  fifty  miles  with  sword  and  flame ;  neither  sex,  nor  age,  found  any 
mercy ;  places  sacred  and  profane  alike,  and  the  most  famous  temple 
of  the  tribes,  were  leveled  with  the  ground.  The  soldiers  remained 
un wounded,  who  had  slain  men  haK-asleep,  unarmed,  or  straggling 
about.  .  .  Germanicus,  that  he  might  be  more  easily  recognized,  pulled 
the  helmet  from  his  head,  and  exhorted  his  men  that  they  should  '  pur- 
sue the  slaughter ;  there  was  no  need  of  captives ;  only  the  extermination 
of  the  people  would  put  an  end  to  the  war.'  " — [Tacitus:  Annal. ;  I. : 
51;  II.:  21. 

TV. :  p.  176. — "The  commander  of  the  French  chivalry,  the  Count 
de  Nevers,  had  been  taken  iu  the  battle.  Bajazet  ordered  that  he 
should  be  spared,  and  permitted  him  to  select  twenty-four  more  of  the 
Cliristian  nobles  from  among  the  prisoners,  whose  lives  were  also 


500  APPENDIX, 

granted.  The  Sultan  then  gave  the  signal  for  the  slaughter  of  the  rest 
[10,000]  to  commence.  .  .  The  Sultan  sate  there  from  daybreak  till  foui 
in  the  afternoon,  enjoying  with  inexorable  eye  the  death-pangs  of  liia 
foes,  when  at  last  the  pity  or  the  avarice  of  his  grandees  made  them 
venture  to  come  between  him  and  his  prey,  and  implore  that  the 
Christians  who  yet  remained  alive  might  be  made  slaves  of,  instead  of 
being  slain.  Bajazet  assented ;  and  the  surviving  captives,  after  the 
Sultan  had  chosen  his  fifth  part  from  among  them,  were  given  up, 
each  to  the  Mahometan  who  had  taken  him  in  battle." — [Creasy: 
*'Hist.  of  Ottoman  Turks";  New  York  ed.,  1877:  pp.  39-41. 

The  ransom  paid  for  the  captives  spared,  was  200,000  ducats. — 
[Menzies:  "Turkey,  Old  and  New";  Vol.  1:  p.  90. 

V. :  p.  176. — "King  Xerxes  had  sent  no  heralds  either  to  Athens  or 
Sparta,  to  ask  earth  and  water,  for  a  reason  which  I  will  now  relate. 
When  Darius  some  time  before  sent  messengers  for  the  same  purpose, 
they  were  thrown,  at  Athens,  into  the  pit  of  punishment  [in  the  side 
of  which  iron  hooks  were  inserted,  to  tear  in  pieces  those  thrown  in], 
and  at  Sparta  into  a  well,  and  bidden  to  take  therefrom  earth  and 
water  for  themselves,  and  carry  it  to  their  king." — [Herodotus:  vil. : 
133. 

Pausanias  says  that  it  was  IVEiltiades,  the  son  of  Cimon,  who  pro- 
posed the  putting  to  death  of  the  heralds  at  Athens,  and  that  a  Divine 
vengeance  fell  upon  his  family  in  consequence. — ["Descript.  of 
Greece";  III.:  13. 

"At  the  time  of  their  arrival  \i.  e.,  of  the  Lacedaemonian  ambassa- 
dors, in  Thrace]  two  Athenian  envoys  chanced  to  be  at  the  court  of 
Sitalces ;  and  they  entreated  his  son  Sadocus,  who  had  been  made  an 
Athenian  citizen,  to  deliver  the  envoys  into  their  hands.  He  con- 
sented, and  seized  them  as  they  were  on  their  way  through  Thrace  to 
the  vessel,  in  which  they  were  going  to  cross  the  Hellespont ;  they 
were  then  handed  over  to  the  Athenian  envoys,  who  conveyed  them  to 
Athens.  On  the  very  day  of  their  an-ival,  fearing  that  Aristeus  would 
do  them  still  further  mischief  if  he  escaped,  they  put  them  all  to  death 
without  trial,  and  without  hearing  what  they  wanted  to  say;  they  then 
threw  their  bodies  down  precipices." — [Thucydides:  H. :  67;  (abridged.) 

VI. :  p.  177. — "If  I  decide  this  case  in  favor  of  my  own  Government, 
I  must  disavow  its  most  cherished  principles,  and  reverse  and  forever 
abandon  its  essential  pohcy.  The  country  cannot  afford  the  sacrifice. 
If  I  maintain  these  principles,  and  adhere  to  that  policy,  I  must  surren- 
der the  case  itself.  It  will  be  seen,  therefore,  that  this  Government 
could  not  deny  the  justice  of  the  claim  presented  to  us  in  this  respect 
upon  its  merits.    We  are  asked  to  do  to  the  British  nation  just  whai 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VL  501 

we  have  alwaya  insisted  that  all  nations  ought  to  do  to  us.  .  .  They 
will  be  cheerfully  liberated.  Your  lordship  will  please  indicate  a  time 
and  place  for  receiving  them." — [Letter  of  Secretary  Seward:  20th  De- 
cember, 1861. 

There  was  a  wide  feeling  at  the  time  that  Mr.  Seward's  discussion  of 
the  subject  had  been  rather  ingenious  than  ingenuous ;  that  he  had  been 
chiefly  intent  from  the  outset  on  releasing  the  nation  from  all  peril  of 
a  war  with  Great  Britain,  if  this  could  be  done  on  any  ground  not  hu- 
miliating to  it.  But  the  point  on  which  his  concession  turned  was  cer- 
tainly one  of  material  importance :  that  by  releasing  the  offending  shij), 
after  takmg  from  her  the  envoys.  Com.  Wilkes  had  lost  his  claim  to 
the  exercise  of  belligerent  rights  over  her,  or  anything  on  board  of  her ; 
that  his  action  in  removing  the  envoys  then  became,  on  his  own  inter- 
pretation, an  attempt  to  exercise  police  power  over  a  neutral  vessel  on 
the  high  seas — against  the  right  of  any  power  to  do  which  the  United 
States  had  protested,  negotiated,  and  fought ;  that  the  ship  should  have 
been  released  altogether,  or  else  have  been  seized  altogether,  and  sent 
into  port  for  adjudication.  This  doctrine  appears  to  be  henceforth 
established. 

VII.:  p.  179. — "The  more  varied  and  more  active  intercourse  be- 
tween different  nations,  by  which  the  rougher  contrasts  of  nationali- 
ties were  necessarily  removed,  chiefly  contributed  to  this  result  [re- 
moval of  limitations  of  law  by  nationality].  But  the  influence  of 
Christianity  must  least  of  all  be  overlooked,  which,  as  a  common  bond 
of  spiritual  life  embracing  the  most  diverse  nations,  has  thrown  their 
characteristic  differences  more  and  more  into  the  background. " — [Sa- 
vigny:  "  Private  International  Law  " ;  Edinburgh  ed.,  1880:  p.  59. 

"  If  there  is  anything  that  can  unite  men  and  nations  of  the  most 
discordant  characters,  it  is  the  profession  of  the  same  religion ;  espe- 
cially a  religion,  the  very  essence  of  whose  morality  is  to  consider  all 
mankind  as  brethren.  .  .  The  Law  of  Nations  being  founded  in  a 
great  measure  upon  the  systems  of  morality,  good  or  bad,  pursued  by 
certain  sets  or  classes  of  people,  and  Eeligion  being  everywhere  the 
ground-work  of  the  morality  observed,  the  Christian  Religion,  as  we 
have  mentioned  in  a  former  chapter,  may  be  supposed  not  merely  to 
influence,  but  to  be  the  chief  guide  of  the  Christian  Law  of  Nations." — 
[Ward:  "  Enquiry  into  Law  of  Nations";  London  ed.,  1795:  Vol.  2: 
pp.  33,  1. 

VIII. :  p.  179. — "  In  that  stage  of  civilization  where  every  man  has 
his  own  personal  deity,  and  no  two  perhaps  the  same,  the  bond  that 
unites  man  to  man  is  exceedingly  slight.  Each  man's  hand  is,  in  some 
measure,  agauist  his  brother's.     Opposition,  or  unlikeness,  among  the 


502  APPENDIX. 

gods,  leads  to  hostility  among  men.  Thus  family  is  arrayed  against 
family,  tribe  against  tribe,  nation  against  nation,  because  the  pecuLai 
God  of  the  one  family,  tribe,  or  nation,  is  deemed  hostile  to  all  others. 
.  .  A  stranger,  whom  accident  or  design  brings  to  the  devotee,  is  a 
choice  offering.  The  saint  is  a  murderer.  War  is  a  constant  and 
normal  state  of  man,  not  an  exception,  as  it  afterward  becomes;  the 
captives  are  sacrificed  as  a  matter  of  course." — [Theo.  Parker:  "Dis- 
course of  Eeligion";  Boston  ed.,  1843:  pp.  60,  61. 

IX. :  p.  180. — The  discussion  by  Mr.  Grote  of  the  origin,  purposes, 
and  general  effects  of  the  Amphictyanic  Assembly,  is  clear  and  suf- 
ficient. It  will  be  found  in  his  "  History  of  Greece  " ;  London  ed. ,  1873 : 
Vols,  n.:  pp.  169-177;  vni. :  192-4;  ix.:  338-353;  413-416;  456,  ef  seg. 

"  These  are  first  attempts  at  procuring  admission  for  the  principles 
of  humanity  in  a  land  filled  with  border  feuds.  There  is  as  yet  no 
question  of  putting  an  end  to  the  state  of  war,  still  less  of  combining 
for  imited  action ;  an  attempt  is  merely  made  to  induce  a  group  of 
states  to  regard  themselves  as  belonging  together,  and  on  the  ground 
of  this  feeling  to  recognize  mutual  obligations,  and  in  the  case  of  in- 
evitable feuds  at  all  events  mutually  to  refrain  from  extreme  meas- 
ures of  force." — [Curtius:  "  Hist,  of  Greece";  New  York  ed. :  Vol.  1: 
p.  138. 

X. :  p.  181. — "When  Hellenes  fight  with  barbarians,  and  barbarians 
with  Hellenes,  they  will  be  described  by  us  as  being  at  war  when  they 
fight,  and  by  nature  in  a  state  of  war ;  but  when  Hellenes  fight  with 
one  another,  we  shall  say  that  they  are  by  nature  friends,  and  at  such 
a  time  Hellas  is  in  a  state  of  disorder  and  distraction ;  and  enmity  of 
that  sort  is  to  be  called  discord."— [Plato:  "  Republic  ":  V. :  470. 

"  To  the  barbarians  he  [Alexander]  carried  himself  very  haughtily, 
as  if  he  were  fully  persuaded  of  his  divine  birth  and  parentage ;  but  to 
the  Grecians,  more  moderately,  and  with  less  affectation  of  divinity, 
except  it  were  once,  in  writing  to  the  Athenians  about  Samos." — [Plu- 
tarch: "Lives";  Boston  ed.,  1859:  Vol.  IV.:  p.  195. 

Yet  among  these  "barbarians"  were  the  Persians,  of  whose  royal 
pavilions,  with  their  golden  vessels,  exquisite  perfumes,  and  altogether 
magnificent  furniture,  Alexander  on  entering  had  said, "  This,  it  seems, 
is  Royalty"!— [p.  184. 

It  is  perhaps  still  more  remarkable,  as  showing  how  ingi^ained  was 
this  feeling  in  the  Hellenic  mind,  that  ^schylus,  in  the  "Persae," 
represents  the  chorus  of  Persians,  the  messenger  of  Xerxes,  and  the 
Queen  Mother  Atossa  herself,  as  constantly  and  familiarly  describing 
themselves  as  "  barbarians." 

XI.:  p.  181. — "And  the  equitable  rule  of  war  has  been  fully  d& 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VL  503 

clared  under  highest  religious  sanctions,  by  the  fecial  law  of  the  Roman 
people.  From  which  it  may  clearly  be  understood  that  no  war  is  just 
unless  it  be  one  waged  for  the  recovery  of  property,  or  unless  it  haa 
been  solemnly  declared  and  denounced  beforehand. " — [Cicero :  De  OflH: 
ciis:  I.:  XI. 

XII. :  p.  181. — "  The  laws  of  every  people,  governed  by  statutes  and 
customs,  are  partly  peculiar  to  itself,  partly  common  to  aU  mankind. 
The  laws  which  each  people  constitutes  for  itself,  and  which  are  pecu- 
liar to  it,  are  called  Jus  Civile,  as  the  special  Law  of  that  state  ;  but 
what  natural  reason  prescribes  among  all  men,  and  what  equally  ob- 
tains among  all  peoples,  is  called  Jus  Gentium." — [Gaius  :  Institut. : 
I.:  1. 

Xin.  :  p.  182. — "Anciently,  Assembly,  Council  of  State,  Parlia- 
ment, States-General,  it  was  all  one  thing  among  us.  They  wrote 
neither  in  Celtic,  German,  nor  Spanish,  in  our  early  centuries.  The 
little  that  they  wrote  was  couched  in  terms  of  the  Latin  language,  by 
the  hands  of  certain  clerks  ;  they  represented  the  whole  assembly,  of 
great  vassals,  lords,  opulent  men,  or  of  some  prelates,  by  the  word 
'  Council.*  So  it  came  to  pass  that  one  finds  in  the  sixth,  seventh, 
eighth  centuries,  so  many  *  Councils,'  which  were  in  reality  only  Coun- 
cils of  State."— [Voltaire:  "CEuvres";  Paris  ed.,  1876;  Tom.  vn. :  p. 
859. 

XIV. :  p.  182. — "  It  was  into  the  midst  of  a  people  already  so  con- 
fusedly mixed  that  the  invasion  of  the  Barbarians  in  the  fifth  century 
mtroduced  the  new  elements.  The  peoples  of  all  the  North  of  Europe 
and  of  Asia,  from  the  Rhine  and  the  Danube  to  Scandinavia,  from  the 
German  Ocean  to  the  walls  of  China,  precipitated  themselves  upon  the 
Roman  Empire.  They  pushed  forward,  hurled  themselves  upon  one 
another,  and  when  they  did  not  remain  to  found  a  durable  govern- 
ment over  the  country  which  they  had  invaded,  they  left  at  least  mili- 
tary colonies,  which  were  only  slowly  incorporated  with  the  rest  of 
the  inhabitants.  All  these  thus  contributed  to  form  the  new  French 
nation,  which  by  no  means  finds  its  sole  origin  in  the  small  tribe  of 
the  Franks.  Among  these  invading  peoples  are  specially  mentioned 
the  three  great  races  of  the  Germans,  the  Sarmatians,  and  the  Scythi- 
ans, each  of  which  divided  itself  into  many  minor  peoples,  distin- 
guishable from  each  other,  but  aU  recognizable  by  their  Teutonic, 
Slavic,  or  Tartar  speech,  by  their  manner  of  making  war,  by  their  cus- 
toms of  hie,  and  by  their  fixed  habitations  or  nomadic  life." — [Sis- 
mondi:  "Hist,  des  Franyais";  Paris  ed.,  1821;  Tom.  I. :  pp.  106-107. 

Ammianus  Marcellinus  shows  how  the  Huns  appeared  to  the  hardj 
»nd  experieii'.ed  Roman  soldier: — 


50i  APPENDIX. 

*' A  race  savage  beyond  parallel.  At  the  moment  of  their  birth  the 
cheeks  of  their  infant  children  are  deeply  marked  by  an  iron,  in  ordei 
that  the  vigor  of  their  hair,  instead  of  growing  at  the  proper  season, 
may  be  withered  by  the  wrinkled  scars ;  and  accordingly  they  grow  up 
without  beards.  .  They  are  of  great  size,  and  low-legged,  so  that  you 
might  fancy  them  two-legged  beasts.  .  .  They  live  on  the  roots  of 
such  herbs  as  they  get  in  the  fields,  or  on  the  half -raw  flesh  of  any  ani 
mal,  which  they  merely  warm  rapidly  by  placing  it  between  their  o'^ti 
thighs  and  the  backs  of  their  horses.  They  never  shelter  themselves 
under  roofed  houses,  but  avoid  these,  as  people  ordinarily  avoid  sepul- 
chres. .  .  After  a  tunic  is  once  put  around  their  necks,  however  worn 
it  becomes,  it  is  never  taken  off  or  changed  till,  from  long  decay,  it 
becomes  so  ragged  as  to  fall  to  pieces.  .  .  In  one  respect  you  may 
pronounce  them  the  most  formidable  of  all  warriors,  for  when  at  a 
distance  they  use  missiles  of  various  kinds  tipped  with  sharpened  bones 
instead  of  the  usual  points  of  javelins,  but  when  they  are  at  close 
quarters  they  fight  with  the  sword,  without  any  regard  for  their  own 
safety.  None  of  them  plough,  or  ever  touch  a  plough-handle  ;  for 
they  have  no  settled  abode,  but  are  homeless  and  lawless,  perpetually 
traveling  with  their  wagons,  which  they  make  their  homes.  .  .  In 
truces  they  are  treacherous  and  inconstant,  beii^g  liable  to  change  their 
minds  at  every  breeze  of  any  fresh  hope  which  presents  itself :  and, 
like  brute  beasts,  they  are  utterly  ignorant  of  the  distinction  between 
right  and  wrong.  They  have  no  respect  for  any  religion  or  supersti- 
tion whatever ;  are  immoderately  covetous  of  gold,  most  fickle,  and 
irascible."— [Rom.  Hist.:  xxxi. :  2;  §§2-11. 

XV.:  p.  183. — "Almost  all  our  superstitions  are  the  remains  of  a 
religion  anterior  to  Christianity,  and  which  Christianity  has  not  been 
able  entirely  to  root  out.  If  at  the  present  day  we  wished  to  recover  a 
living  image  of  paganism,  we  should  have  to  look  for  it  in  some  village 
lying  forgotten  in  the  depths  of  a  country  district,  altogether  behmd 
the  times."— [Renan:  "  Hibbert  Lects.";  London  ed.,  1880:  p.  32. 

"  It  was  the  legislation  of  the  pagan  emperors,  carried  on  by  Valen- 
trnian  and  Valens,  and  received  into  the  codes  of  Athalaric,  of  Liut- 
prand,  and  of  Charlemagne,  which  founded  the  penal  laws  against 
sorcery  which  prevailed  in  the  Middle  Age :  and  thus  did  the  torch  of 
the  ancient  wisdom  kindle  the  piles  with  which  the  Church  has  been 
reproached." — [Fred.  Ozanam :  "Civil,  in  Fifth  Cent.";  London  ed., 
1867:  Vol.  1:  p.  133. 

XVI.:  p.  183. — "That  time  [after  Charlemagne]  was  indeed  the 
nadir  of  order  and  civilization.  From  all  sides  the  torrent  of  barbar- 
ism which  Charles  the  Great  had  stemmed  was  rushiug  down  upon  hi« 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  505 

-empire.  The  Saracen  wasted  tlie  Mediterranean  coasts,  and  sacked 
Rome  herself.  The  Dane  and  Norseman  swept  the  Atlantic  and  the 
North  Sea,  pierced  France  and  Germany  by  their  rivers,  burning,  slay- 
ing, carrymg  off  into  captivity :  pouring  through  the  Straits  of  Gibral- 
tar, they  fell  upon  Provence  and  Italy.  By  land,  while  Wends  and 
Czechs  and  Obatrites  threw  off  the  German  yoke  and  threatened  the 
borders,  the  wild  Hungarian  bands,  pressing  in  from  the  steppes  of  the 
Caspian,  dashed  over  Germany  like  the  flying  spray  of  a  new  wave  of 
barbarism,  and  caiTied  the  terror  of  their  battle-axes  to  the  Apennines 
and  the  ocean.  No  one  thought  of  common  defence,  or  wide  organiza- 
tion ;  the  strong  built  castles,  the  weak  became  their  bondsmen,  or  took 
shelter  under  the  cowl ;  the  governor — count,  abbot,  or  bishop — tight- 
ened his  grasp,  turned  a  delegated  into  an  independent,  a  personal  into 
a  territorial  authority,  and  hardly  owned  a  distant  and  feeble  suzerain. 
The  grand  vision  of  a  universal  Christian  empu'e  was  utterly  lost  in 
the  isolation,  the  antagonism,  the  increasing  localization  of  all  powei^ : 
it  might  seem  to  have  been  a  passing  gleam  from  an  older  and  better 
world. "— [Bryce :  "  Holy  Roman  Empire  " ;  London  ed. ,  1876 :  pp.  78-9. 
"  It  is  impossible  to  read  the  history  of  the  early  middle  ages  without 
feeling  that,  for  the  first  six  centuries  after  the  fall  of  the  Western  Em- 
pire, there  is  little  or  no  progress.  Tlie  night  grows  darker  and  darker, 
and  we  seem  to  get  ever  deeper  into  the  mire.  Not  till  we  are  quite 
clear  of  the  wrecks  of  the  Carolingian  fabric,  not  till  the  days  of  Will- 
iam the  Norman  and  Hildebrand,  do  we  seem  to  be  making  any  satis- 
factory progress  out  of  Chaos  into  Cosmos." — [Hodgkin  :  "Italy,  and 
her  Invaders";  Oxford  ed.,  1880  :  Vol.  2  :  p.  550. 

XVII.:  p.  183. — "Even  the  Pope  himself  Bernard  did  not  spare, 
when,  placed  by  his  lordship  over  the  church  to  maintain  the  whole 
church-system  in  steadiness  and  cohesion,  he  gave  to  egotism  and 
selfishness  the  means  to  escape  the  punishment  of  the  law.  When  the 
archbishop  of  Trier  had  made  complaint  that  through  the  favor  which 
Ids  young  suffragan-bishops  of  noble  connections  found  at  the  Roman 
Court  the  Metropolitan-office  was  becoming  an  empty  title,  Bernard 
himself  took  the  matter  in  hand,  and  wrote  to  the  Pope  [Innocent  II.]  : 
'  It  is  the  universal  voice  of  those  who  in  our  region  rule  their  congre- 
gations with  faithful  solicitude  that  all  justice  is  abolished  in  the 
Church,  that  the  episcopal  dignity  is  being  made  contemptible,  since 
no  bishop  has  it  in  his  power  to  punish  offences  against  God,  nor-  can 
he  at  all  chastise  what  is  unlawful  even  in  his  own  diocese.  And  you, 
and  the  Roman  Court,  only  push  on  this  criminal  business.  What 
they  [the  bishops]  order  that  is  good,  you  prohibit.  What  they  justly 
forbid,  you  favor.  All  the  vicious  and  quarrelsome  among  the  con- 
gregations, with  the  outcasts  from  the  convents,  rush  to  you:    anrl 


5i)6  APPENDIX, 

when  they  come  back  from  you  they  exalt  and  glorify  themselves,  as 
having  found  protection  in  those  from  whom  they  should  on  the  other 
hand  much  rather  have  found  chastisement. " — [Neander  :  ' '  Der  heiliga 
Bernhard":  Gotha,  1848  :  S.  133. 

Calvin  quotes  with  admiration  other  words  of  Bernard  to  the  Pope- 
[Eugenius  III.] :  "You  are  made  a  superior.  For  what  purpose  ?  Not 
to  exercise  dominion,  I  apprehend.  However  highly  we  think  of  our- 
selves, let  us  remember  that  we  are  appointed  to  a  mmistry,  not  in- 
vested with  a  sovereignty.  .  .  Go,  if  you  dare,  and  while  sustaining 
the  office  of  a  temporal  sovereign  usurp  the  name  of  an  apostle,  or  fill- 
ing an  apostolical  office  usurp  a  temporal  sovereignty." — ["  Institutes  " : 
IV. :  11  :  §  11. 

After  saying  at  the  close  of  his  learned  and  sympathetic  life  of  Bei'- 
nard  that  * '  No  further  expression  of  judgment  concerning  this  man  is- 
needed,  his  life  and  his  ministry  sufficiently  portray  him, "  Neander  addSy 
what  every  one  it  would  seem  must  feel:  "It  is  perfectly  evident  that 
we  may  not  despise  an  age  in  which  one  man,  surrounded  by  no 
worldly  splendor,  through  his  purely  moral  forc.e,  through  the  eleva- 
tion and  strength  of  his  spirit,  secured  for  himself  a  distinction  so  vast, 
and  an  influence  so  nughty." — [S.  522. 

XVIII.:  p.  184. — "From  this  period  [eleventh  century]  are  to  be- 
dated  the  fii^t  efforts  to  establish,  in  different  parts  of  France,  what 
was  called  'God's  peace,'  '  God's  truce.'  The  words  were  well  chosen 
for  prohibiting  at  the  same  time  oppression  and  revolt ;  for  it  needed 
nothing  less  than  the  law  and  the  voice  of  God  to  put  some  restraint 
on  the  barbarous  manners  and  passions  of  men,  great  or  small,  lord  or 
peasant.  It  is  the  peculiar  and  glorious  characteristic  of  Christianity 
to  have  so  well  understood  the  primitive  and  permanent  evil  in  human 
nature  that  it  fought  against  all  the  great  iniquities  of  mankind,  and 
exposed  them  in  principle,  even  when,  in  point  of  general  practice,  it 
neither  hoped  nor  attempted  to  sweep  them  away.  Bishops,  priests, 
and  monks  were  in  their  personal  lives,  and  in  the  councils  of  the 
Church,  the  first  propagators  of  God's  peace  or  truce ;  and  in  more  than 
one  locality  they  induced  the  laic  lords  to  follow  their  lead. " — [Guizot : 
"Hist,  of  France";  Boston  ed. :  Vol.  1:  p.  313. 

Bluntschli  dates  the  new  birth,  or  energetic  revival,  of  International 
Law,  from  the  later  point  at  which  '  the  unity  of  the  Papal  Church  in 
Western  Europe  was  broken  by  the  Reformation  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, while  already,  before  that,  the  secular  Imperial  unity  (of  the  Holy 
Roman  Empire)  had  shown  itself  an  impracticable  scheme.'  From 
that  point  the  light  of  this  science,  previously  in  the  world,  but  long- 
restrained,  rapidly  advanced. — ["Das  Modeme  Volkerrecht " :  Nord 
Imgen  .  1878  :  S.  17. 


JSOT^S  TO  LECTURE  VL  507 

XIX.  :  p.  185. — "It  has  often  been  observed,  and  it  is  in  leed 
abundantly  obvious,  that  the  greater  part  of  international  law  is  not 
law,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  term.  It  is  not  a  command.  It  doea 
not  proceed  from  any  definite  political  organ.  It  has  no  sanction.  Sub- 
ject to  the  exception  that  I  shall  presently  notice  [customs  of  the  Sea], 
it  is  merely  the  customs  which  regulate  the  intercoui*se  of  independent 
political  communities." — [W.  E.  Heam  :  "Aryan  Household";  Lon- 
don ed.,  1879  :  p.  450. 

"International  Law,  as  understood  among  civilized  nations,  may  be 
defined  as  consisting  of  those  rules  of  conduct  which  reason  deduces,  as 
consonant  to  Justice,  from  the  nature  of  the  society  existing  among 
independent  nations ;  with  such  definitions  and  modifications  as  may 
be  established  by  general  consent." — [Wheaton  :  "Elements  of  Inter- 
national Law  " :  Part  I. :  §  14. 

Professor  Cairns  says:  "International  Law  is  the  formal  expres- 
sion of  the  public  opinion  of  the  civilized  world  respecting  the  rules  of 
conduct  which  ought  to  govern  the  relations  of  independent  nations,  and 
is,  consequently,  derived  from  the  source  from  which  all  public  opin- 
ion flows, — the  moral  and  intellectual  convictions  of  mankind." — 
[Note,  to  Wheaton.] 

President  Woolsey  defines  International  Law  as  "the  aggregate  of 
the  rules  which  Christian  states  acknowledge  as  obligatory  in  their 
relations  to  each  other,  and  to  each  other's  subjects." — ["Introd.  to 
Intemat.  Law";  New  York  ed.,  1879:  p.  3. 

XX. :  p.  185. — "In  point  of  fact  many  Christian  ideas  shine  forth 
before  the  foundation  of  International  Law.  Christianity  sees  in  God 
the  Father  of  mankind,  and  in  men  the  children  of  God.  The  unity 
of  the  human  race,  and  the  brotherhood  of  all  peoples,  are  herein  rec« 
ognized  in  their  principle.  The  Christian  religion  humbles  the  haugh- 
tiness of  the  ancient  self-complacency,  and  demands  humility ;  it  lays 
its  hand  on  egotism  at  its  roots,  and  requires  its  renunciation ;  it  reck- 
ons self-sacrifice  for  men  grander  than  any  lordship  over  them.  It 
thus  removes  the  impediments  which  were  in  the  way  of  any  ancient 
Law  of  Nations.  Its  highest  commandment  is  the  love  of  mankind, 
and  it  carries  this  up  even  to  the  point  of  love  for  enemies.  It  works 
to  liberate  and  enfranchise,  as  it  purifies  men,  and  unites  them  in 
reconciliation  with  God.  It  announces  the  Message  of  Peace.  It  be- 
comes then  a  thing  not  remote  to  transport  these  ideas  and  command- 
ments into  the  language  of  Law  and  to  transform  them  into  funda- 
mental propositions  of  a  humane  Law  of  Nations,  which  recognizes 
all  peoples,  as  free  members  of  the  great  human  family,  which  con- 
cerns itself  for  the  World's  peace,  and  which  even  in  time  of  war 


508  APPENDIX. 

demands  respect  for  the  rights  of  humanity." — [BluntscMi  :  "Dai 
Modeme  Volkerrecht " :  Nordlingen  :  1878  :  S.  14. 

XXI. :  p.  186. — "  Fight  therefore  for  the  religion  of  God,  and  oblige 
not  any  to  what  is  difficult,  except  thyself ;  however,  excite  the  faith- 
ful to  war,  perhaps  God  will  restrain  the  courage  of  the  unbelievers. 
.  .  It  hath  not  been  granted  unto  any  prophet  that  he  should  possess 
captives,  until  he  hath  made  a  great  slaughter  of  the  infidels  in  the 
earth.  .  .  As  to  the  infidels,  let  them  be  deemed  of  kin  the  one  to  the 
other.  Unless  ye  do  this,  there  will  be  a  sedition  in  the  earth,  and  a 
grievous  corruption.  .  .  When  ye  encounter  the  unbelievei's,  strike 
off  their  heads,  until  ye  have  made  a  great  slaughter  among  them 
and  bind  them  in  bonds,  and  either  give  them  a  free  dismission  after 
wards,  or  exact  a  ransom ;  until  the  war  shall  have  laid  down  its  arms 
If  ye  assist  God,  by  fighting  for  his  religion,  he  will  assist  you  against 
your  enemies,  and  will  set  your  feet  fast ;  but  as  for  the  infidels,  let 
them  perish. " — [Koran :  cc.  4,  8,  47 :  Sale's  trans. ;  London  ed. :  pp.  70 
146,  410-11. 

XXII.:  p.  188. — '*Les  Romains  etoient  eclaires;  cependant  ces 
memes  Romains  ne  furent  pas  cheques  de  voir  reunir  dans  la  per- 
sonne  de  Cesar  un  Dieu,  un  pretre,  et  un  Athee. " — [Gibbon :  ' '  Essai 
sur  I'Etude  de  la  Litterature  " :  Misc.  Works;  London  ed.,  1796:  Vol. 
II. :  p.  476. 

In  his  history  of  the  "Decline  and  Fall,"  he  says,  with  absolute 
truth,  that  "the  various  modes  of  worship,  which  prevailed  in  the 
Roman  world,  were  all  considered  by  the  people  as  equally  true ;  by 
the  philosopher  as  equally  false,  and  by  the  magistrate  as  equally  use- 
ful."—[Boston  ed.,  1854:  Vol.  1:  p.  165. 

XXIII. :  p.  190. — "  The  Christian  religion  has  all  the  marks  of  the  ut- 
most justice  and  utility,  but  none  more  apparent  than  the  severe  in- 
junction it  lays  upon  all  to  yield  obedience  to  the  magistrate,  and  to 
maintain  and  defend  the  laws.  What  a  wonderful  example  of  this 
has  the  Divine  wisdom  left  us,  which,  to  establish  the  salvation  of 
mankind,  and  to  conduct  His  glorious  victory  over  death  and  sin, 
would  do  it  after  no  other  way  but  at  the  mercy  of  our  ordinary  po- 
litical organization ;  subjecting  the  progress  and  issue  of  so  high  and 
so  salutary  an  effect,  to  the  blindness  and  injustice  of  our  customs  and 
observances;  sacrificing  the  innocent  blood  of  so  many  of  His  own 
elect,  and  so  long  a  loss  of  many  years,  to  the  maturing  of  this  inestima " 
ble  fruit  I  "—[Montaigne:  "Essais";  Paris  ed.,  1826:  Tom.  1:  p.  178. 

XXIV. :  p.  190. — "  It  [International  Law]  has  neither  lawgiver  noi 
BUj>reme  judge,  since  independent  States    acknowledge  no  superioi 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  50^ 

human  authority.  Its  organ  and  regulator  is  public  opinion ;  its  su 
preme  tribunal  is  history,  which  forms  at  once  the  rampart  of  justice, 
and  the  Nemesis  by  whom  injustice  is  avenged.  Its  sanction,  or  the 
obligation  of  all  men  to  respect  it,  results  from  the  moral  order  of  the 
universe,  which  will  not  su£Per  nations  and  individuals  to  be  isolated 
from  each  other,  but  constantly  tends  to  unite  the  whole  family  of 
mankind  in  one  great  harmonious  Society." — [Heffter:  "  Das  Europa- 
ische  Volkerrecht ":  quoted  by  Wheaton:  ''  Elements,  etc.":  Part  I. : 
§10. 

XXV. :  p.  191. — "  The  reduction  of  the  Law  of  Nations  to  a  system 
was  reserved  for  Grotius.  It  was  by  the  advice  of  Lord  Bacon  and 
Peiresc  that  he  undertook  this  arduous  task.  He  produced  a  work  which 
we  now  indeed  justly  deem  imperfect,  but  which  is  perhaps  the  most  com- 
plete that  the  world  has  yet  owed,  at  so  early  a  stage  in  the  progress  of 
any  science,  to  the  genius  and  learning  of  one  man." — [Sir  James 
Mackintosh:  "Misc.  Works";  London  ed.,  1846:  Vol.  1:  p.  351. 

Other  writers  in  the  same  department,  but  of  transient  influence  or 
local  celebrity,  had  preceded  Grotius — as  Francis  de  Victoria,  Dominic 
Soto,  Balthazar  Ayala,  and  Albericus  Gentilis ;  and  early  in  the  seven- 
teenth century,  Suarez,  a  Jesuit  of  Granada,  wrote  an  extended  treatise, 
in  ten  books,  on  the  principles  of  natural  law  and  of  positive  jurispru- 
dence, entitled  ''Tractatus  de  legibus  ac  Deo  legislatore  " :  of  which 
Hallam  gives  a  synopsis  and  a  description  in  his  "  Introduction  to  the 
Literatui-e  of  Europe,"  Part  III.,  chap.  4,  sees.  1,  3.  He  describes 
the  author  as  "  by  far  the  greatest  man  in  the  department  of  ,moral 
philosophy  which  the  order  of  Loyola  produced  in  that  age,  or  perhaps 
in  any  other." 

Mr.  Hallam  then  proceeds  to  consider  the  work  of  Grotius. — "  The 
name  of  Suarez  is  obscure  in  comparison  of  one  who  soon  came  forward 
in  the  great  field  of  natural  jurisprudence.  This  was  Hugo  Grotius, 
whose  famous  work  was  published  at  Paris  in  1625.  .  .  It  is  acknowl- 
edged by  every  one  that  the  pubhcation  of  this  treatise  made  an  epoch 
in  the  philosophical,  and  almost  we  might  say  m  the  political,  histoi-y 
of  Europe.  .  .  Within  thirty  or  forty  years  from  its  publication,  we 
find  the  work  of  Grotius  generally  received  as  authority  by  professors 
of  the  Continental  universities,  and  deemed  necessary  for  the  student 
of  civil  law,  at  least  in  the  Protestant  countries  of  Europe.  In  Eng- 
land, from  the  difference  of  laws,  and  from  some  other  causes,  the  in- 
fluence of  Grotius  was  far  slower,  and  even  ultimately  much  less  gen- 
eral. He  was,  however,  treated  with  great  respect  as  the  founder  of 
the  modem  law  of  nations,  which  is  distinguished  from  what  formerly 
bore  that  name  by  its  more  continual  reference  to  that  of  Nature.  .  . 
The  book  may  be  considered  as  nearly  original,  in  its  general  platforav 


510  APPENDIX. 

as  any  work  of  man  in  an  advanced  state  of  civilization  and  learning 
can  be.  .  .  He  extends  too  far  his  principle,  that  no  nation  can  be 
excluded  by  another  from  privileges  which  it  concedes  to  the  rest  of 
the  world.  In  all  these  positions,  however,  we  perceive  the  enlarged 
and  philanthropic  spirit  of  the  system  of  Grotius,  and  his  disregard  of 
the  usages  of  mankind  when  they  clashed  with  his  Christian  sense  of 
justice.  .  .  An  implicit  deference  to  what  he  took  for  Divine  truth 
was  the  first  axiom  in  the  philosophy  of  Grotius ;  if  he  was  occasion- 
ally deceived  in  his  application  of  this  principle,  it  was  but  according 
to  the  notions  of  his  age." — ["Literature  of  Europe";  London  ed., 
1847:  Vol.  2:  pp.  543-5,  553,  588. 

The  title  which  Grotius  first  proposed  for  his  great  treatise  was, 
"The  Law  of  Nature  and  of  Nations." — [Burigny's  Life  of  Grotius: 
B.  ni. :  c.  9. 

XXVI. :  p.  192.— Mr.  Wheaton's  "  Elements  of  International  Law  " 
was  translated  into  Chinese  in  1864,  under  the  auspices  of  the  Imperial 
Government.  It  was  translated  by  one  of  the  American  missionaries 
in  China  (Rev.  Dr.  Martin),  with  whom  was  associated  a  conunission 
of  Chinese  scholars,  appointed  by  the  Minister  for  Foreign  Affau-s. 
The  work  was  made  a  text-book  for  the  officials  of  the  empire;  and  tlie 
translation  has  been  quoted  and  relied  upon  by  the  Chinese  Govern- 
ment in  its  diplomatic  correspondence. — [See  Dana's  Note  to  Wheaton* 
(8) :  p.  22. 

XXYII. :  p.  192. — "  The  same  rules  of  morality  which  hold  together 
men  in  families,  and  which  form  families  into  commonwealths,  also 
link  together  those  commonwealths  as  members  of  the  gi'eat  society  of 
mankind.  .  .  It  is  their  interest,  as  well  as  their  duty,  to  reverence,  to 
practice,  and  to  enforce,  those  rules  of  justice  which  control  and  re- 
strain injury,  which  regulate  and  augment  benefit,  which  even  in 
their  present  imperfect  observance  preserve  civilized  states  in  a  tolera- 
ble condition  of  security  from  wrong,  and  which,  if  they  could  be  gen- 
erally obeyed,  would  establish,  and  permanently  maintain,  the  well- 
being  of  the  universal  commonwealth  of  the  human  race." — [Sir  James 
Mackintosh:  "Misc.  Works";  London  ed.,  1846;  Vol.  1:  p.  345. 

"The  Law  of  Nations  is  naturally  founded  upon  this  principle:  that 
different  nations  ought  to  do  to  each  other,  in  time  of  peace  the  most 
of  good,  in  time  of  war  the  least  of  evil,  which  is  possible  without  prej- 
udice to  their  own  interests." — [Montesquieu:  "De  TEsprit  des  Loix"; 
13;  Paris  ed.,  1803;  Tom.  L :  p.  72. 

"  It  has  been  the  object  of  the  writer  of  these  pages  to  strengthen  or 
add  to  the  previously  existing  proof  that  States  as  well  as  Individuals 
of  which  they  are  the  aggregate,  have  in  their  collective  cai)acity  a 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  511 

«phere  of  duty  assigned  to  them  by  God.  He  has  endeavoured  fco  for- 
ward the  gi'eat  argument  that  there  are  International  Rights,  and 
therefore  International  Laws.  .  .  At  least  he  has  the  consolation  of 
thinking  that  he  has  been  a  fellow-worker  with  Grotius,  and  that  h* 
has  endeavoured,  however  feebly,  to  accomplish  the  wish  which  Leib- 
uitz  expressed,  when  he  said,  'Rightly  is  reckoned  by  learned  men 
among  the  things  to  be  desired,  the  Law  of  nature  and  of  nations  inter 
preted  according  to  Christian  teaching.'  .  .  It  was  the  voice  of  inspira- 
tion, though  it  borrowed  the  pen  of  the  heathen,  which  pronounced 
that  the  just  state  differed  in  nothing  from  the  just  man  [Plato:  "  Re- 
pubhc " ;  IV. :  443] :  it  was  the  voice  and  the  language  of  inspiration 
which  has  told  us  that  '  the  work  of  righteousness  shall  be  peace ;  and 
the  effect  of  righteousness,  quietness  and  assurance  forever.'  " — [Philli" 
more:  "Comm.  on  International  Law";  Philadelphia  ed.,  1857:  Vol. 
S:  pp.  507-8. 

XXVIII.:  p.  193. — "Since  men  are  naturally  equal,  and  a  perfect 
equality  prevails  in  their  rights  and  obligations,  as  equally  proceeding 
from  nature, — Nations,  composed  of  men,  and  considered  as  so  many 
free  Persons  living  together  in  the  state  of  nature,  are  naturally  equal, 
and  inherit  from  nature  the  same  obligations  and  rights.  Power  or 
weakness  does  not,  in  this  respect,  produce  any  difference.  A  dwarf  is 
as  much  a  man  as  a  giant :  a  small  republic  is  not  less  a  sovereign 
state  than  the  most  powerful  kingdom. " — [Vattel :  * '  Law  of  Nations  " ; 
Philadelphia  ed. ,  1839 :  p.  Ixiii. 

XXIX. :  p.  193. — The  congress  of  the  five  great  powers,  meeting  by 
their  plenipotentiaries  at  London  in  November,  a.d.  1830,  was  con- 
vened by  request  of  the  King  of  the  Netherlands,  to  effect,  if  possible, 
a  conciliatory  mediation  between  the  t^vo  divisions  of  his  kingdom.  It 
at  once  commanded  a  cessation  of  hostilities,  on  both  sides.  It  then 
proceeded  to  arrange  for  the  future  independence  of  Belgium,  on  cer- 
tain conditions.  Against  this,  both  the  king  and  the  provisional 
Government  of  Belgium  protested,  though  on  different  grounds.  The 
congress  based  its  proceedings  on  the  ground  that  "while  each  nation 
has  its  particular  rights,  Europe  also  has  its  rights,  conferred  by  social 
order  " ;  and  announced  its  determination  to  put  an  end  to  the  contest. 
In  the  summer  of  1831,  the  king,  rejecting  certain  arrangements  pro- 
posed in  favor  of  the  Belgic  provinces,  attacked  these  with  armed  force ; 
and  the  final  Treaty  signed  between  the  five  powers  and  Belgium  in 
November,  a.d.  1831,  was  signed  against  his  protest.  France  and  Great 
Britain  united,  however,  to  compel  him  to  evacuate  the  Belgian  terri- 
tory, and  he  finally  yielded  to  the  superior  force,  and  in  April,  A.D. 
1839,  signed  the  conclusive  Treaty. 


512  APPENDIX. 

The  protracted  negotiations  on  the  part  of  the  external  powers  had 
therefore  successively  the  characters  of  a  pacific  mediation,  of  a  forci- 
ble arbitration,  and  of  an  armed  interference. 

The  history  is  told  in  full  by  Wheaton :  "  Hist,  of  Law  of  Nations  ", 
New  York  ed.,  1845:  pp.  539-554. 

XXX. :  p.  193. — President  Woolsey's  statements  on  this  point  are 
not  only  recent,  but  are  eminently  considerate  and  just: — 

' '  Interference  on  the  score  of  humanity  or  of  religion  can  be  justi- 
fied only  by  the  extreme  circumstances  of  the  case.  .  .  Elizabeth  ox 
England  sent  aid  to  the  revolted  Hollanders  on  religious  grounds,  and 
Cromwell's  threats  slackened  the  persecution  of  the  Waldenses  by  the 
Duke  of  Savoy." 

He  quotes  with  approval  a  maxim  cited  by  Wheaton,  that  'whatever 
a  nation  may  lawfully  defend  for  itself,  it  may  defend  for  another  if 
called  on  to  interpose ' ;  and  adds,  in  another  chapter,  that  "  if  a  nation 
should  undertake  a  war  with  no  pretext  of  right,  other  states  may  not 
only  remonstrate,  but  use  force  to  put  down  such  wickedness.  .  .  In 
some  rare  cases  a  great  and  flagrant  wrong  committed  by  another  na- 
tion, against  religion  for  instance,  or  liberty,  may  justify  hostile  inter- 
ference on  the  part  of  those  who  ai'e  not  immediately  affected.  And  this, 
not  only  because  the  wrong,  if  allowed,  may  threaten  all  states,  but 
also  because  the  better  feelings  of  nations  impel  them  to  help  the  in- 
jured."—["Introd.  to  Intemat.  Law";  New  York  ed.,  1879:  pp.  59-60, 
183,  185. 

XXXI. :  p.  194. — "It  has  been  alleged  by  Denmark  that  our  acqui- 
escence, until  recent  years,  in  the  Elsineur  exactions,  was  a  tacit  sanc- 
tion of  their  legitimacy,  as  '  established  by  usage. '  .  .  -iWe  can  recog- 
nize no  'immemorial  usage'  as  obligatoiy  when  it  conflicts  with 
natural  privileges  and  international  law.  These  ancient  customs  have, 
in  many  instances,  been  found  to  be  inconsistent  with  rights  now  gen- 
erally recognized  in  the  more  liberal  and  reasonable  practice  of  com- 
mercial nations,  and  have  been  made  to  yield  to  views  better  suited  to 
the  improved  system  of  foreign  trade." — [Letter  of  Secretary  Marcy,  tc 
Mr.  Bedinger,  July  18,  1858. 

XXXII. :  p.  195.— Thus  the  Treaty  signed  at  St.  Petersburgh  in  1772, 
by  the  plenipotentiaries  of  Russia,  Austria,  and  Prussia,  providing  for 
the  first  partition  of  Poland,  was  never  regarded  in  the  civilized  world, 
outside  of  those  states,  as  justifying  the  action  which  the  contract  con- 
templated. It  was  encountered  by  indignant  remonstrances  from  the 
French,  English,  Swedish,  and  Danish  governments.  It  was  recog- 
nized as  practically  an  illegitimate  agreement  between  neighboring 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  51;^ 

public  robbers,  to  do  an  act  of  profitable  violence ;  and  the  impression 
has  not  yet  ceased  that  a  certain  retribution  can  be  traced  at  different 
points  in  the  subsequent  history  of  the  three  confederated  powers,  for 
what  was  generally  held,  and  is  by  many  still  considered,  a  colossal 
crime  against  liberty  and  ci^alization. 

XXXIII. :  p.  196. — The  illustration  given  by  Francis  I.  of  contempt 
for  public  promises,  is  at  once  signal  and  familiar.  Defeated  and  taken 
prisoner  at  Pavia,  in  1525,  and  subsequently  carried  to  Madrid,  he 
signed  a  Treaty,  humiliating,  no  doubt,  and  promised  on  the  honor  of 
a  prince  to  execute  it,  or,  as  the  alternative,  to  return  as  a  prisoner  to 
Spain.  On  reaching  France,  however,  he  applied  to  the  Pope  for  ab- 
solution from  the  oath  which  he  had  taken,  refused  to  execute  the 
Treaty,  which  he  had  signed  with  a  secret  protest,  refused  equally 
to  return  to  Spain — on  the  ground  that  he  had  not  been  treated  there 
as  a  gentleman — and  substituted  different  stipulations  for  those  of  the 
Treaty,  as  the  only  ones  which  he  would  fulfil.  Even  these  were 
really  extorted  from  him  by  the  fact  that  two  of  his  sons  had  been  de- 
tained as  hostages  by  the  emperor,  Charles  Fifth,  who  had  evidently 
entertained  a  just  suspicion  of  the  truth  and  honor  of  Francis.  The 
whole  story  is  fairly  told  by  Robertson  :  " History  of  Charles  Fifth": 
Boston  ed.,  1857:  Vol.  II.:  pp.  117-122,  134-41:  175-8:  et  al 

Guizot  gives  the  cutting  reply  of  Charles  to  the  proposal  of  Francis 
ior  a  material  change  in  the  terms  of  the  Treaty :  "The  king  of  France 
promised  and  swore,  on  the  faith  of  an  honest  king  and  prince,  that  if 
he  did  not  carry  out  the  said  restitution  of  Burgundy,  he  would  in- 
continently come  and  surrender  himself  prisoner  to  H.  M.  the  Emperor. 
Let  the  king  of  France  keep  his  oath  ! " 

The  comment  of  the  veteran  diplomatist  on  the  trick  of  the  secret 
protest  made  by  Francis  before  signing  the  Treaty  is  curt  and  just : 
"We  may  not  have  unlimited  faith  in  the  scrupulosity  of  modem  dip- 
lomats; but  assuredly  they  would  consider  such  a  pohcy  so  funda- 
mentally worthless  that  they  would  be  ashamed  to  practise  it.  We 
may  not  hold  sheer  force  in  honor ;  but  open  force  is  better  than  men- 
dacious weakness.  "—["Hist,  of  France";  Bost.  ed.,  Vol.  4:  pp.  108, 106. 

XXXIV. :  p.  196. — President  Woolsey  quotes  from  Flassan  a  state- 
ment which  illustrates  the  ancient  function  of  ambassadors:  "Louis 
XI.,  on  sending  the  Sieurs  du  Bouchage  and  De  SoUiers  to  the  Dukes 
of  Guienne  and  of  Brittany,  gave  them  for  their  instructions,  '  If  they 
lie  to  you,  lie  still  more  to  them.' " — ["  Introd.  to  Study  of  Int.  Law "; 
New  York  ed.,  1879  :  p.  133 

XXXV.  :  p.  196.— "They  have  invented  a  hundred  subterfuges,  a 
33 


614  APPENDIX. 

hundred  sophistries,  to  supply  justification  to  their  wrong  doingsk, 
They  only  use  thought  to  give  authority  to  injustice,  and  they  onlj 
employ  words  in  order  to  disguise  their  thoughts." — [Voltaire  :  "Dia- 
logues": XIV.  (Le  chapon  et  la  poularde):  CEuvres;  Paris  ed.,  1876: 
Tom.  VI :  p.  646. 

XXXVI. :  p.  196. — "Ambassadors  in  Ordinary  have  been  attributed 
by  some  to  Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  whose  pohcy  led  him  to  entertain 
them  at  various  courts,  as  a  kind  of  honourable  spies :  by  others,  with 
no  small  probability,  to  an  imitation  of  the  Pope,  who  had  long  been 
in  the  habit  of  sending  Nimcios  to  reside  at  various  courts  in  the  ser- 
vice of  religion.  .  .  Henry  IV.  of  France,  while  king  of  Navarre,  en- 
tertained none  at  other  courts;  and  Henry  Seventh,  'that  wise  and 
politic  king,'  says  Lord  Coke,  '  would  not  in  all  his  time  suffer  Liegei 
[resident]  ambassadours  of  any  foreign  King  or  Prince  within  his  realm, 
nor  he  with  them;  but,  upon  occasion,  used  ambassadours.'  So  late 
as  1660,  a  member  of  the  Polish  Diet  asserted  that  the  Ambassador  of 
France  had  no  cause  of  residence  there,  and  that  as  he  did  not  return 
home,  according  to  the  custom  of  ambassadors^  he  ought  to  be  con- 
sidered as  a  spy.  .  .  And  even  the  Dutch  debated,  in  1651,  how  far 
this  sort  of  embassy  was  of  any  advantage  to  them." — [Ward  :  "En 
quiry  into  the  Law  of  Nations";  London  ed.,  1795:  Vol.  2:  pp.  483-4. 

"The  Russia  of  the  16th  and  17th  centuries  is  an  Oriental  State,  al- 
most without  relations  with  Europe.  .  .  From  this  time  Russia 
sought  to  enter  into  regular  relations  with  foreign  powers.  Her  dip- 
lomatic traditions  were  those  of  the  East  or  Byzantium.  .  .  When 
foreign  ambassadors  arrived  in  Rxissia,  they  were  treated  with  magnifi- 
cence and  distrust.  From  the  time  they  crossed  the  frontier,  they  and 
their  people  were  fed,  housed,  and  provided  with  carriages,  but  a 
pristaf  attached  to  then  persons  watched  carefully  that  they  obtained 
no  interviews  with  the  natives,  nor  information  about  the  state  of  the 
country.  .  .  If  the  Tzar  was  not  contented  with  him,  the  ambassa- 
dor's palace  became  a  prison,  where  no  native  might  penetrate;  and 
carefully  studied  humiliations  were  practised,  to  extract  from  him  con- 
cessions or  to  abridge  his  stay." — [Rambaud  :  "History  of  Russia"; 
London  ed.,  1879  :  Vol.  1 :  pp.  301,  311-13. 

"According  to  a  barbarous  usage  which  the  Ottomans  have  only 
lately  discontinued,  the  declaration  of  war  with  Russia  (November  28, 
1710)  was  marked  by  the  imprisonment  of  the  Russian  ambassador 
Tolskoi,  in  the  Castle  of  the  Seven  Towers."— [Sir  E.  S.  Creasy  :  "His- 
tory of  Ottoman  Turks";  New  Yorked.,  1877  :  p.  329. 

This  note  is  added  :  "  The  state  answer  of  the  ancient  Sultans,  when 
requested  to  receive  an  embassy,  was,  *  The  Sublime  Porte  is  open  to 
all.'    This,  according  to  the  Turkish  interpretation,  implied  a  safe  con* 


not:es  to  lecture  VI.  516 

duct  in  coming,  but  gave  no  guarantee  about  departing.  Levesque,  in 
bis  History  of  Russia,  remarks  on  tbe  Turkish  custom  of  imprisoning 
ambassadors  when  a  war  broke  out:  'This  barbarous  custom  bas  been 
justly  beld  a  reproach  to  them.  Yet  Charles  13th  detained  the  Prince 
Khilliiof,  ambassador  of  Russia,  and  left  him  to  die  in  captivity;  and 
no  historian  has  reproached  him  for  this  crime  against  the  Law  of 
Nations.'" 

It  was  at  the  congress  at  Nimirof,  in  a.d,  1737,  that  the  Turkish  pleni- 
potentiaries seem  to  have  first  invoked  the  protection  of  International 
Law.  "  The  language  used  by  them  was  remarked  as  new  from  Otto- 
man lips,  inasmuch  as,  besides  their  customary  references  to  the  Koran, 
they  appealed  to  the  Christian  gospels,  and  to  Christian  writera  on  the 
law  of  nations,  to  prove  the  bad  faith  of  their  adversaries." — [p.  366. 

XXXVII.  :  p.  197. — "For  this  reason  [because  nature  has  made 
plants  and  animals  for  the  use  of  man]  the  art  of  war  is,  in  some  sense, 
a  part  of  the  art  of  acquisition ;  for  hunting  is  a  part  of  it,  which  it  is 
Decessary  for  us  to  employ  against  wild  beasts,  and  against  those  of 
mankind  who,  being  intended  by  nature  for  slavery,  are  unwilling 
to  submit  to  it;  and,  on  this  occasion,  such  a  war  is  by  nature  just." — 
[Aristotle:  "Politics":  L:  8. 

' '  He  [Zeno]  recommended  the  regarding  all  who  were  not  wise,  in 
the  Stoic  sense,  as  strangers,  enemies,  and  slaves." — [Dollinger:  "The 
Gentile  and  the  Jew";  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  1:  p.  348. 

"By  our  ancestors  he  was  called  'an  enemy'  whom  we  now  call 
'  a  stranger.'  This  the  Twelve  Tables  demonstrate  [as  in  the  words], 
'Adversus  hostem  aetema  auctoritas.'" — [Cicero:  "DeOffic":  I.:  xii. 

"Nothing  but  some  positive  compact  [under  the  Greeks  and  Ro 
mans]  exempted  the  persons  of  aliens  from  being  doomed  to  slavery, 
the  moment  they  passed  the  bounds  of  one  state,  and  touched  the  con- 
fines of  another." — [Wheaton :  "  Hist,  of  Law  of  Nations  " ;  New  York 
ed.,  1845:  p.  1. 

"  There  are  still  some  peoples  in  our  Europe  whose  law  does  not 
permit  a  foreigner  to  purchase  a  field  and  a  grave  in  their  territoiy. 
The  barbarous  droit  (TAubaine,  under  which  a  foreigner  sees  his  pa- 
ternal possessions  pass  into  the  Royal  treasury,  still  subsists  in  all 
Christian  kingdoms,  at  least  wherever  it  has  not  been  limited  or  an- 
nulled (dSroge)  by  special  treaties. " — [Voltaire :  ' '  Essai  sur  les  Mceui^  " : 
(Euvres;  Paris  ed.,  1877:  Tom.  III. :  p.  608. 

It  is  added,  in  a  note,  that  when  it  was  proposed  to  abolish  the  droit 
d'Auhaine  in  France,  by  a  general  law,  the  great  Chancellor  d'Agues- 
seau  resisted  it,  because,  as  he  said,  "this  law  was  the  most  ancient 
law  of  the  monarchy." 

Ml-.  Brace  has  given  a  summary  of  historical  facts  on  this  subject :— 


516  APPENDIJ. 

"According  to  the  Burgundian  law,  he  [the  stranger]  could  be  tor* 
tured  under  suspicious  circumstances,  and  even  one  of  Charlemagne's 
capitularies  permits  the  same  treatment.  By  a  law  of  the  Salian 
Franks,  when  a  stranger  wished  to  settle  in  a  village  or  canton,  he 
was  not  permitted  the  privilege  if  a  single  resident  opposed.  .  .  In 
England,  a  stranger  who  wa^  accused  of  any  crime  must  be  at  once 
put  in  jail ;  if  he  was  found  Off  from  the  four  main  roads,  and  making 
no  noise  of  bell,  he  could  be  killed  as  a  thief  ;  no  one  could  harbour 
him  more  than  three  nights,  and  whoever  did  so  even  for  that  time 
was  responsible  for  his  good  conduct.  .  .  The  Saxons  are  said  to  have 
sold  into  slavery  a  stranger  who  had  no  patron.  .  .  It  was  the  four- 
teenth century  before  the  strangers  ceased  to  be  regarded  as  bound  to 
the  soil  in  France,  and  features  of  the  droit  d'Aiibaine  have  survived 
to  the  present  day.  .  .  In  divers  ways  the  unfortunate  foreigners  in 
France  were  plundered  and  taxed  throughout  the  Middle  Ages.  They 
could  not  inherit  or  bequeath  property.  Even  as  late  as  the  sixteenth 
century  the  avbains  could  not  transmit  property,  except  a  fixed  small 
sum,  or  succeed  to  an  estate." — [' '  Gesta  Christi " ;  New  York  ed. ,  1882 : 
pp.  191-4. 

Ingulphus,  in  his  Chronicle,  quotes  the  law  of  '  the  most  jiist  King 
Edward,'  afterward  proclaimed  by  'the  illustrious  King  William, 
under  most  heavy  penalties,'  that  "  No  one  shall  entertain  a  stranger 
for  more  than  three  nights,  imless  a  person  who  is  his  friend  shall 
have  given  him  a  recommendation ;  and  no  one  shall  permit  a  person, 
after  he  is  accused  [rectatus  est]  to  depart  from  his  home." — [Laws  of 
William  the  Conqueror:  I.:  XLVlli. ;  "Ancient  Laws  of  England" 
1840:  Vol.  1:  p.  487. 

XXXVIII. :  p.  197. — The  change  which  has  taken  place  in  the  laws 
and  customs  of  Christian  states,  concerning  the  legal  right  and  privi- 
lege accorded  to  strangers,  is  sufficiently  illustrated  by  the  following 
extracts  from  eminent  French  and  German  authors : — 

"  It  is  now  in  fact  admitted  as  part  of  the  European  Law  of  Nations, 
that  the  judicial  power  of  each  nation  extends  over  the  person  and 
over  the  property  of  the  foreigner  who  resides  in  it,  as  it  does  over  the 
persons  and  the  property  of  natives ;  that,  in  consequence,  foreigners 
are  admitted,  like  native-born  citizens,  to  invoke  the  intervention  of 
the  justices  in  every  place,  whether  against  a  citizen  or  another  for- 
eigner, and  that  the  defendant  may  not  screen  himself  from  such  ju- 
risdiction. [This  is  independent  of  the  privileges  accorded  to  foreign 
ambassadors,  or  by  special  treaty  to  citizens  of  foreign  nations.]  In 
all  these  other  cases,  the  foreigner,  not  only  by  virtue  of  a  generous 
hospitality,  but  as  a  matter  of  reciprocal  justice,  enjoys,  for  his  person 
and  for  his  property,  so  far  as  the  civil  jurisdiction  is  concerned,  a 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  517 

protection  equivalent  [semblable]  to  that  which  the  la^s  give  to  a  na* 
tive." — ["Droit  International  Prive":  M.  Foelix:  Aug.  par  C.  Deman- 
geat;  Paris  ed.,  1866:  Tom.  I.:  p.  308. 

Charlemagne's  legislation,  early  in  the  ninth  century,  commanding 
every  one  '  to  be  hospitable  to  strangers  as  he  would  have  Christ  mer- 
ciful to  him,'  and  instructing  all  judges  to  'give  just  judgment,  put- 
ting no  distinction  of  persons  between  the  stranger  and  the  native  citi- 
zen, since  that  is  the  just  judgment  of  God' — has  certainly  in  the  end 
borne  fruit. 

"  It  is  the  necessary  consequence  of  this  equality  [between  natives 
and  foreigners],  in  its  full  development,  not  only  that  in  each  particu 
lar  state  the  foreigner  is  not  postponed  to  the  native,  but  also  that,  in 
cases  of  conflict  of  laws,  the  same  legal  relations  (cases)  have  to  expect 
the  same  decision,  whether  the  judgment  be  pronounced  in  this  state 
or  in  that.  The  stand-point  to  which  this  consideration  leads  us,  is 
that  of  an  international  common  law  of  nations  having  intercourse 
with  one  another ;  and  this  view  has  always  obtained  wider  recogni- 
tion, under  the  influence  of  a  common  Christian  morality,  and  of  the 
real  advantage  which  results  from  it  to  all  concerned.  .  .  If  the  de- 
velopment of  the  law  thus  begun  is  not  disturbed  by  unforeseen  exter- 
nal circumstances,  it  may  be  expected  that  it  will  at  length  lead  to  a 
complete  accord  in  the  treatment  of  questions  of  collisions  in  all  states. 
.  .  The  Allgemeine  Landrecht  of  Prussia  very  distinctly  recognizes 
the  principle  of  equality  before  the  law,  in  its  treatment  of  native  sub- 
jects and  foreigners ;  and  where  exceptions  occur,  these  are  not  at  all 
intended  to  secure  for  the  domestic  law  an  exclusive  authority  over 
foreigners,  but  they  are  rather  benevolently  directed  to  protect  legal 
acts  from  the  collision  of  local  laws.  .  .  The  French  Code  contains 
but  a  few  rules  that  can  be  regarded  as  determining  questions  of  col- 
lision ;  yet  it  also  unambiguously  recognizes  the  equality  as  to  legal 
rights  of  natives  and  foreigners.  The  Austrian  Code  is  similar  to  the 
Prussian.  It  acknowledges  the  equal  rights  of  foreigners  and  natives, 
and  has  well-intended  provisions  for  the  maintenance  of  legal  acts."— 
[Savigny:  "Private  International  Law";  Edinburgh  ed.,  1880:  pp. 
69-70,  137, 147-8. 

The  editor  adds,  p.  74  (note) :  "  Since  1870,  aliens  may,  in  Great  Brit 
ain  and  Ireland,  take,  hold,  and  dispose  of  real  and  personal  property 
as  if  natural-bom  subjects,  except  that  they  cannot  own  British  ships." 

XXXIX. :  p.  198. — "  The  United  States  have  concluded  over  twenty 
of  such  conventions  [touching  extradition],  most  of  them  terminable 
after  a  certain  number  of  years,  or  at  the  pleasure  of  either  party.  .  . 
The  provision  that  no  person  shall  be  surrendered  on  account  of  polit- 
ical offences  appears  in  twelve  of  them,  and  ought  to  appear  in  all."— 


518  APPEND  I JT. 

[Woolsey:  ''lutrod.  to  Intemat.  Law";  New  York  ed.,  1879:  pp.  117- 
118. 

XL.  :  p.  198. — "  Les  jurisconsultes  Fran9ais  disent  que  I'air  de 
France  est  si  bon  et  si  b^nin  que  dds  qu'un  esclave  entre  dans  le 
roiaume,  mesme  k  la  suite  d'un  ambassadeur,  il  ne  respire  que  liberte, 
et  la  recouvre  aussitot." — [Quoted  by  Savigny :  p.  85  (note). 

Mr.  Brace  quotes  an  ancient  maxim  in  as  direct  an  antithesis  to  this 
as  can  well  be  imagined :  ' '  Residence  also  often  brought  about  slavery. 
Die  Luft  macht  eigen,  "  The  air  makes  the  thrall,"  says  some  old  Ger- 
man proverb.  K  runaways  were  found  living  on  strange  properties, 
they  could  be  enslaved." — [Gesta  Christi:  p.  241. 

XLI. :  p.  199. — The  ancient  tendency  to  the  isolation  of  states,  by 
the  severances  of  race  and  religion,  naturally  generated  the  dislike  of 
commerce  expressed  by  Plato,  in  the  Laws : — 

"  Then  there  is  some  hope  [since  the  city  is  to  be  at  the  distance  of 
eighty  stadia  from  the  sea]  that  your  citizens  may  be  virtuous  :  had 
you  been  on  the  sea,  and  well  provided  with  harbors,  and  an  import- 
ing rather  than  a  producing  country,  some  mighty  Saviour  would  have 
been  needed,  and  Lawgivers  more  than  mortal,  if  you  were  to  have  a 
chance  of  preserving  your  state  from  degeneracy  and  discordance  of 
manners.  But  there  is  comfort  in  the  eighty  stadia ;  although  the  sea 
is  too  near,  especially  if,  as  you  say,  the  harbors  are  so  good.  The  sea 
is  pleasant  enough  as  a  daily  companion,  but  has  also  a  bitter  and 
brackish  quality ;  filling  the  streets  with  merchants  and  shopkeeperSj 
and  begetting  in  the  souls  of  men  uncertain  and  unfaithful  ways — 
making  the  state  unfriendly  and  unfaithful  both  to  her  own  citizens, 
and  also  to  other  nations." — [IV. :  704. 

XLII. :  p.  201. — "  Do  not  think  it  is  impossible  for  any  one  to  please 
God  while  engaged  in  active  military  service.  [Examples :  David,  the 
two  centurions,  the  soldiers  who  came  to  John  for  baptism ;  '  he  did 
not  prohibit  them  to  serve  as  soldiers  when  he  commanded  them  to  be 
content  with  their  pay  for  the  service '].  .  .  Peace  should  be  the  ob- 
ject of  your  desire;  war  should  be  waged  only  as  a  necessity,  and 
waged  only  that  God  may  by  it  deliver  men  from  the  necessity,  and 
preserve  them  in  peace.  Therefore,  even  in  waging  war  cherish  the 
spirit  of  a  peace-maker,  that  by  conquering  those  whom  you  attack 
you  may  lead  them  back  to  the  advantages  of  Peace." — [Augustine: 
Ep.  CLXXXix. :  4,  6. 

Tertullian  refers  to  the  Christian  soldiers  in  the  army  under  Marcus 
A-urelius,  and  says  expressly,  ''  We  sail  with  you,  we  fight  with  you, 
we  till  the  ground  with  you" ;  though  he  gives  it  as  a  reason  why  the 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  619 

Chi'istians,  though  not  fearing  the  sword,  did  not  assail  the  persecuting 
empire,  that  in  their  religion  it  was  counted  better  to  be  slain  than  to 
Blay.— [Apolog. :  5,  43,  87. 

"  Nothing  can  well  be  further  from  the  sentiment  of  Scripture  than 
the  extreme  horror  of  force,  as  a  penal  and  disciplinary  instrument, 
which  is  inculcated  in  modem  times.  '  My  kingdom,'  said  Jesus,  '  ia 
not  of  this  world ;  else  would  my  servants  fight ' : — an  expression 
Tvhich  implies  that  no  kingdom  of  this  world  can  dispense  with  arms, 
and  that  he  himself,  were  he  the  head  of  a  human  polity,  would  not 
forbid  the  sword ;  but  while  '  legions  of  angels '  stood  ready  for  his 
word,  and  only  waited  till  the  Scripture  was  fulfilled  and  the  hour  of 
darkness  was  passed,  to  obey  the  signal  of  heavenly  invasion,  the 
weapon  of  earthly  temper  might  remain  within  the  sheath.  The  infant 
Church,  subsisting  in  the  heart  of  a  military  empire,  and  expecting 
from  on  high  a  military  rescue,  was  not  itself  to  fight ;  not,  however, 
because  force  was  in  all  cases  '  brutal '  and  '  heathenish,'  but  because, 
in  this  case,  it  was  to  be  angelic  and  celestial.  .  .  The  reverence  for 
human  life  is  carried  to  an  inunoral  idolatry,  when  it  is  held  more 
sacred  than  justice  and  right,  and  when  the  spectacle  of  blood  becomes 
more  horrible  than  the  sight  of  desolating  tyrannies  and  triumphant 
hypocrisies.  .  .  We  speak  only  of  the  ultimate  theory  of  this  matter, 
and  simply  afl&rm  that  wherever  law  and  government  exist,  somewhere 
in  the  background  force  must  lurk." — [James  Martineau:  "  Studies  of 
Christianity";  Boston  ed.,  1866:  pp.  345,  354. 

XLIII. :  p.  202. — Gentilis's  definition  of  war  was  a  good  one:  "  Bel- 
lum  est  contentio  publica  armata  justa." 

Sir  James  Mackintosh  thus  limited  the  justice  of  war:  "A  war  ia 
just  against  the  wrong-doer  when  reparation  for  wrong  cannot  other- 
wise be  obtained ;  but  it  is  then  only  conformable  to  all  the  principles 
of  morality,  when  it  is  not  likely  to  expose  the  nation  by  whom  it  is 
levied  to  greater  evils  than  it  professes  to  avert,  and  when  it  does  not 
inflict  on  the  nation  which  has  done  the  wrong  sufferings  altogether 
disproportioned  to  the  extent  of  the  injury."  His  general  principle 
was  thus  stated:  "The  employment  of  force,  in  the  intercourse  of 
reasoaable  beings,  is  never  lawful,  but  for  the  purpose  of  repelling  or 
averting  wrongful  force." — ["  Misc.  Works";  London  ed.,  1846:  Vol. 
2:  pp.  321,  320. 

Milton  put  the  case  well,  in  his  "  Manifesto  of  the  Lord  Protector," 
in  regard  to  the  expedition  to  the  West  ladies: — **  First,  we  have  been 
prompted  to  it  by  necessity;  it  being  absolutely  necessary  to  go  to  war 
with  the  Spaniards,  since  they  will  not  allow  us  to  be  at  peace  with 
^hem  :  and  then,  honour  and  justice  ;  seeing  we  cannot  pretend  to 
/ther  of  these,  if  we  sit  still  and  suffer  such  insufferable  injuries  to  ba 


520  APPENDIX. 

done  to  our  c(yTmtryTnen,as  those  we  have  shown  to  be  done  to  them  is 
the  West-Indies."— [Prose  Works;  London  ed.,  1753:  Vol.  II. :  p.  273. 

XLTV". :  p.  203. — "The  ancient  peoples  regarded  the  enemies  with 
whom  they  were  at  war  as  essentially  without  rights,  and  held  every- 
thing allowable  as  against  them.  To  the  modern  consciousness  of 
Justice  it  is  clear  that  the  rights  of  human  nature  are  to  be  considered 
even  in  war;  since  enemies  have  not  ceased  to  be  men.  .  .  The  sharp- 
ened discrimination  of  the  modern  jurisprudence  first  made  plain 
this  fundamental  conception :  that  war  is  a  contest  of  right  between 
states,  or  different  political  powers,  and  is  in  no  way  a  contest  betweer 
private  citizens,  or  with  such  citizens.  .  .  Out  of  the  distinction  arises 
the  following  governing  principle,  in  the  modem  law  of  nations :  In- 
dividuals, as  private  persons,  are  not  enemies ;  as  belonging  to  their 
respective  states,  they  are  complicated  in  the  hostility  of  those  states. 
So  far  as  private  rights  are  concerned,  the  relation  of  peace,  and  the 
rights  of  peace,  continue.  So  far  as  public  law  comes  in  to  determine, 
the  relation  of  hostility  is  introduced,  and  the  laws  of  war  take  eflPect. " 
— [Bluntschli :  "  Modeme  Volkerrecht " ;  Nordlingen,  1878:  S.  35,  f. 

"  The  true  theory  seems  to  be  that  the  private  persons  on  each  side 
are  not  fully  in  hostile  relations,  but  m  a  state  of  non-intercourse,  in  a 
state  wherein  the  rights  of  intercourse,  only  secured  by  treaty  and  not 
derived  from  natural  right,  are  suspended  or  have  ceased ;  while  the 
political  bodies  to  which  they  belong  are  at  war  with  one  another,  and 
they  only." — [Woolsey:  *'  Introd.  to  Internat.  Law  ";  New  York  ed., 
1879:  p.  207. 

XLY. :  p.  203. — The  instructions  of  the  French  Minister  of  Marine 
to  naval  officers  in  1854  were,  as  quoted  by  President  Woolsey : — "  You 
must  put  no  hindrance  in  the  way  of  the  coast-fishery  even,  on  the 
coasts  of  the  enemy,  but  you  will  be  on  your  guard  that  this  favor, 
dictated  by  an  interest  of  humanity,  draws  with  it  no  abuse  prejudicial 
to  military  or  maritime  operations.  If  you  are  employed  in  the  waters 
of  the  White  Sea,  you  will  allow  to  continue  without  interruption  the 
exchange  of  fresh  fish,  provisions,  utensils,  and  tackling,  which  is  car- 
ried on  habitually  between  the  peasants  of  the  Eussian  coasts  of  the  prov- 
ince of  Archangel  and  the  fishermen  of  the  coast  of  Norwegian  Fin- 
mark."— [See  "Introd.  to  Internat.  Law";  New  York  ed,,  1879:  pp. 
313-14. 

XLVI. :  p.  203.—"  The  first  article  of  the  celebrated  Declaration  of 
Paris  of  1856  is  in  these  words :  *  Privateering  is  and  remains  abol- 
ished '  [as  matter  of  compact  between  the  parties,  not  as  an  alteration 
of  International  Law].  .  .  The  original  parties  to  the  Declaration  were 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  52t 

Great  Britain,  France,  Eussia,  Prussia,  Austria,  Sardinia,  and  Turkey. 
Some  forty  other  powers  gave  in  their  adhesion  to  the  Declaration, 
embracing  nearly  all  the  states  of  Europe  and  South  America.  .  . 
Proposals  were  made  to  the  United  States  to  accede  to  the  Declara* 
tion.  Mr.  Marcy,  then  Secretary  of  State,  declined  to  become  a  party  to 
it  as  an  entirety,  unless  with  additious.  .  .  But  the  United  States  would 
accede  to  the  Declaration,  if  an  article  should  be  added  protecting  from 
capture  all  private  property  at  sea  not  contraband.  This  proposal  is 
often  called  the  American  Amendment.  Russia  made  known  to  the 
other  parties  ^o  the  Declaration  her  readiness  and  desire  to  support  the 
American  Amendment,  if  its  adoption  should  be  taken  into  considera- 
tion by  the  other  parties.  The  French,  Prussian,  Italian,  and  Nether- 
land  governments  likewise  expressed  to  the  American  ministers  their 
desire  to  have  the  American  Amendment  adopted.  It  is  understood 
that  the  defeat  of  the  Amendment  was  caused  by  the  opposition  of 
Great  Britain. "—[Wheaton:  "Internat.  Law":  Dana's  note:  pp.  454-5. 

XL VII. :  p.  204. — *'  The  use  of  poisoned  weapons,  or  the  distribution 
of  poison-materials  and  elements  of  contagion  in  the  enemy's  country, 
is  an  offense  against  International  Law.  So  also  weapons  are  prohibited 
which  inflict  a  suffering  that  accomplishes  no  purpose  [zwecklose],  such 
as  arrows  with  barbs,  scrap  shot  or  splintered  glass  in  place  of  mus- 
ket-balls. "—[Bluntschli :  "Moderne  Volkerrecht " ;  Nordlingen,  1878: 
§  557-8. 

XLYIII. :  p.  204. — The  following  are  fair  examples  of  the  "Instruc- 
tions for  the  government  of  armies,"  prepared  by  Dr.  Lieber,  and  ap- 
proved by  the  President : — 

"4.  Martial  Law  is  simply  military  authority  exercised  in  accord- 
ance with  the  laws  and  usages  of  war.  Military  oppression  is  not 
Martial  Law ;  it  is  the  abuse  of  the  power  which  that  law  confers.  .  . 
11.  It  [Martial  Law]  disclaims  all  extortions  and  other  transactions  for 
individual  gain;  all  acts  of  private  revenge,  or  connivance  at  such 
acts.  Offences  to  the  contrary  shall  be  severely  punished,  and  esx)e- 
cially  so  if  committed  by  oflicers.  .  .  16.  Military  necessity  does  not 
admit  of  cruelty,  that  is,  the  infliction  of  suffering  for  the  sake  of  suf 
f ering  or  for  revenge,  nor  of  maiming  or  wounding  except  in  fight,  noi 
of  torture  to  extort  confessions.  It  does  not  admit  of  the  use  of  poison 
in  any  way,  nor  of  the  wanton  devastation  of  a  district.  .  .  25.  In 
modem  regular  wars  of  Europeans,  and  of  their  descendants,  protec- 
tion of  the  inoffensive  citizen  of  the  hostile  country  is  the  rule ;  priva- 
tion and  disturbance  of  private  relations  are  the  exceptions.  .  .  29 
The  ultimate  object  of  all  modem  war  is  a  renewed  state  of  peace.  . 
85.  Classical  works  of  art,  libraries,  scientific  collections,  or  precioui 


522  APPENDIJ^. 

Instruments,  such  as  astronomical  telescopes,  as  well  as  hospital, 
must  be  secured  against  all  avoidable  injury,  even  "when  they  are  con 
tained  in  fortified  places  whilst  besieged  or  bombarded.  .  .  37.  The 
United  States  acknowledge  and  protect,  in  hostile  countries  occupied 
by  them,  religion  and  morality ;  strictly  private  property ;  the  persona 
of  the  inhabitants,  especially  of  women;  and  the  sacredness  of  domes- 
tic relations.  Offences  to  the  contrary  shall  be  rigorously  punished.  .  . 
71.  Wlioevor  intentionally  inflicts  additional  wounds  on  an  enemy  al- 
ready wholly  disabled,  or  kills  such  an  enemy,  or  who  orders  or  en- 
courages soldiei-s  to  do  so,  shall  suffer  death,  if  duly  convicted.  .  . 
79.  Every  captured  woimded  enemy  shall  be  medically  treated,  accord 
ing  to  the  ability  of  the  medical  staff." 

What  the  custom  of  antiquity  was  in  time  of  civil  war  is  well  enough 
indicated  by  a  remark  of  Tacitus:  "The  centre  of  the  army  being 
broken,  Otho's  soldiers  fled  precipitately  toward  Bedriacmn.  The  space 
before  them  was  great ;  the  roads  were  obstructed  with  heaps  of  slain ; 
the  slaughter  therefore  was  the  more  dreadful  ;  since  in  civil  wars 
prisoners  are  never  reserved  as  booty." — [Histor. :  11. :  44. 

XLIX. :  p.  205. — The  preamble  to  the  articles  adopted  by  the  Con- 
vention of  Geneva,  August  22, 1864,  says: — "The  sovereigns  of  the  fol- 
lowing countries,  to  wit :  Baden,  Belgium,  Denmark,  Holland,  Spain, 
Portugal,  France,  Prussia,  Saxony,  Wurtemberg,  and  the  Federal 
Council  of  Switzerland,  animated  with  a  common  desire  of  mitigating 
as  far  as  in  their  power  the  evils  inseparable  from  war,  of  suppressing 
needless  severities,  and  of  ameliorating  the  condition  of  soldiers 
wounded  on  fields  of  battle,  having  concluded  to  determine  a  treaty 
for  this  purpose,  .  .  their  plenipotentiaries  have  agreed  upon  the  fol- 
lowing articles  "  [ten  in  number].  The  convention  was  originally 
signed  by  representatives  of  twelve  countries.  Nineteen  others,  or 
thirty-one  in  all,  have  now  adopted  its  articles.  It  has  been  well  said 
that  "  in  1866  Europe  was  better  prepared  than  ever  before  for  the  care 
of  those  who  suffered  from  the  barbarisms  of  war.  She  was  ready 
with  some  degree  of  ability  to  oppose  the  arms  of  charity  to  the  arms 
of  violence,  and  to  make  a  kind  of  war  on  war  itself."  In  1868,  a  sec- 
ond diplomatic  Conference  was  convened  at  Geneva,  at  which  were 
adopted  additional  articles,  improving  the  Treaty,  and  extending  its 
beneficent  action  to  maritime  wars.  "The  whole  of  Europe  is  mar- 
shalled under  the  banner  of  the  Red  Cross.  To  its  powerful  and 
peaceful  sign  the  Committee  hopes  to  bring  all  nations  of  the  earth.  .  . 
Their  ensign  waves  in  Siberia,  on  the  Chinese  frontier,  and  in  Turk- 
istan;  through  the  African  Committee,  in  Algeria  and  Egypt;  and 
Oceanica  has  a  Committee  at  Batavia." — ["The  Red  Cross  of  the 
Geneva  Convention":  1881. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VI.  523 

L. :  p.  205. — The  Government  and  the  people  of  Great  Britain  wera 
perhaps  reasonably  distrustful  of  a  scheme  which  had  its  initiative  with 
the  Emperor  of  Russia.  They  possibly  recalled  the  words  of  Burke, 
and  felt  them  to  be  applicable  to  a  different  occasion:  "  Hypocrisy,  of 
course,  delights  in  the  most  sublime  speculations ;  for  never  intending 
to  go  beyond  speculation,  it  costs  nothing  to  have  it  magnificent." — ■ 
["Eeflect.  on  French  Revolut.":  Works;  Bost.  ed.,  1839:  Vol.  3:  p.  84. 

LI. :  p.  206. — *'  Under  the  reign  of  Marcus,  the  Roman  generals  pen- 
etrated as  far  as  Ctesiphon  and  Seleucia.  They  were  received  as 
friends  by  the  Greek  colony ;  they  attacked  as  enemies  the  seat  of  the 
Parthian  kings ;  yet  both  cities  experienced  the  same  treatment.  The 
sack  and  conflagration  of  Seleucia,  with  the  massacre  of  three  hundred 
thousand  of  the  inhabitants,  tarnished  the  glory  of  the  Roman  triumph. " 
A  third  of  a  century  later,  Ctesiphon,  having  partly  recovered  its 
strength,  ' '  was  taken  by  assault ;  the  king,  who  defended  it  in  person, 
escaped  with  precipitation ;  an  hundred  thousand  captives  and  a  rich 
booty  rewarded  the  fatigues  of  the  Roman  soldiers." — [Gibbon  :  "De- 
cline and  Fall";  London  ed.,  1848  :  Vol.  1 :  pp.  267-8. 

LII. :  p.  206. — Schiller's  poetic  vividness  of  conception  has  not  sur 
passed  his  historical  accuracy  in  sketches  which  he  presents  of  many 
features  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War.  Of  the  two  which  are  subjoined, 
the  first  portrays  the  sack  of  Madgeburg;  the  other  the  condition  of  the 
country  which  the  war  had  ravaged : — 

' '  A  murderous  scene  now  arrests  us,  for  which  history  has  no  lan- 
guage, and  poetry  has  no  pencil.  Not  guileless  childhood,  nor  helpless 
age,  neither  youth,  nor  sex,  nor  rank,  nor  beauty,  could  disarm  the 
rage  of  the  victors.  Women  were  outraged  in  the  arms  of  their  hus- 
bands ;  the  daughter  at  the  father's  feet ;  and  the  defenceless  sex  had 
only  the  distinction  of  serving  in  sacrifice  to  a  twofold  fury.  No  place 
was  so  hidden,  and  none  so  sacred,  that  it  could  escape  the  all-searching 
rapacity.  Fifty-three  women  were  found  beheaded  in  a  single  church. 
The  Croats  delighted  themselves  with  throwing  children  into  the 
flames — Pappenheim's  Walloons  with  transfixing  nui'sing  babes  upon 
their  mothers'  breasts.  Some  of  the  officers  of  the  league,  revolting 
from  a  sight  so  full  of  horrors,  ventured  to  remind  Count  Tilly 
that  he  might  put  an  end  to  such  massacre.  '  Come  again  in 
an  hour,'  was  his  answer;  'I  will  see  then  what  I  will  do.  The 
soldier  must  have  something  for  his  peril  and  toil.'  In  uninter- 
rupted fury  the  horrible  atrocities  continued,  until  at  last  smoke 
and  flames  put  a  limit  to  the  ravin.  To  add  to  the  general  distrac- 
tion, and  to  break  any  resistance  of  the  citizens,  some  had  almost  at 
the  outset  set  fu-e  to  different  parts  of  the  town.     Soon  arose  a  storm* 


524  APPENDIX. 

wind,  which  drove  the  flames  with  fierce  rapidity  thi'ough  the  whole 
city,  and  the  conflagration  became  general.  Frightful  was  now  the 
crush,  through  smoke-clouds  and  over  corpses,  through  di'awn  swords, 
through  tumbling  ruins,  through  streaming  blood.  The  atmosphere 
was  roasting,  and  the  unendurable  heat  forced  at  last  the  destroyer 
himself  to  fly  to  his  camp.  In  less  than  twelve  hours,  this  populous, 
strong,  vast  city,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  of  Germany,  lay  in  ashes, 
two  churches  and  a  few  small  houses  alone  excepted." — ["  Geschichte 
des  Dreiszigjahr.  Kriegs":  Werke  :  Stuttgart;  Band  IV. :  S.  292,  f. 

' '  Burned  castles,  desolated  fields,  villages  in  ashes,  lay  for  miles  on 
all  sides  in  a  horrible  desolation,  while  the  impoverished  inhabitants 
went  forth  to  increase  the  number  of  the  incendiaries,  and  to  repay  upon 
those  of  their  countrymen  who  had  been  spared  what  they  had  them- 
selves suffered.  There  was  no  shelter  against  oppression,  except  for 
each  one  to  help  oppress.  The  towns  groaned  under  the  scourge  of  un- 
bridled and  rapacious  garrisons,  which  consumed  the  property  of  the 
citizens,  and  to  whom  the  liberty  of  war,  the  license  of  position,  the  priv- 
ilege of  necessity,  gave  warrant  for  the  crudest  wantonness.  .  .  The  neg- 
lect of  the  fields,  the  destruction  of  towns,  and  the  multiplication  of  armies 
which  stormed  over  the  exhausted  country,  had  hunger  and  high  prices 
for  then-  necessary  concomitants ;  and  in  the  later  years  failure  of  the 
crops  added  yet  further  to  the  misery.  The  crowding  of  men  into  camps 
and  military  quarters,  famine  on  the  one  side  and  riotous  excess  on  the 
other,  produced  pestilential  diseases,  which  even  more  than  sword  or 
fire  devastated  the  country.  All  bands  of  order  were  loosed  in  this 
long  chaos ;  respect  for  human  rights,  regard  for  laws,  purity  of  man- 
ners, truth  and  faith,  ceased,  while  strength  alone  ruled  with  iron 
sceptre;  and  men  grew  savage  with  the  country." — [S.  392,  f. 

The  terrific  scenes  which  followed  the  surrender  of  Harlem  have  been 
made  familiar  by  the  brilliant  pages  of  Motley  ["Rise  of  Dutch  Re- 
public"; New  York  ed.,  1856  :  Vol.  2  :  pp.  452-7.] 

It  was  the  old  wail,  which  ^schylus  had  heard,  which  went  up  from 
these  cities : — 

"For  sad  it  were  to  hurl  to  Hades  dark 

A  city  of  old  fame. 

The  spoil  and  prey  of  war, 
With  foulest  Bhame  in  dust  and  ashes  laid, 
By  an  Achaean  foe  at  God'R  decree ; 
And  that  our  women,  old  and  young  alike, 

Be  dragged  awaj%  ah  me  ! 

Like  horses,  by  their  hair, 

Their  robes  torn  off  from  them. 
And  lo,  the  city  wails,  made  desolate, 

"While  with  confused  cry 
Th  e  wretched  prisoners  meet  doom  worse  than  death. 


NOIM^  TO  LECTURE  VI.  523 

"  And  hollow  din  is  beard  tbrouffhout  the  town, 
Hemmed  in  by  net  of  towers  ; 
And  man  by  man  is  slaughtered  with  the  spear, 
And  cries  of  bleeding  babes, 
Of  children  at  the  breast, 
Are  heard  in  piteous  wail." 

["Seven  against  Thebes":  310-321;  336-341; 
(Plumptre's  trans.) 

I JII. :  p.  206. — The  scheme  of  Henry  Fourth,  communicated  to 
Queen  Elizabeth,  and  enthusiastically  applauded  by  Sully,  is  fully  de- 
scribed in  Sully's  Memoirs  [Book  30].  It  was  inspired  by  the  desire  of 
the  king  "to  render  France  happy  forever;  and  as  she  cannot  perfectly 
enjoy  this  felicity,  unless  all  Europe  partakes  of  it,  so  it  was  the  hap- 
piness of  Europe  which  he  labored  to  procure,  in  a  manner  so  solid  and 
durable  that  nothing  should  afterward  be  able  to  shake  its  founda- 
tions. .  .  His  whole  design  was  to  save  himself  and  his  neighbours 
those  immense  sums  which  the  maintenance  of  so  many  thousand 
soldiers,  so  many  fortified  places,  and  so  many  military  expenses,  re- 
quire ;  to  free  them  forever  from  the  fear  of  those  bloody  catastrophes 
so  common  in  Europe ;  to  procure  them  an  uninterrupted  repose ;  and, 
finally,  to  unite  them  all  m  an  indissoluble  bond  of  security  and  friend- 
ship." 

It  contemplated  preserving  and  strengthening  the  several  existing 
religions  of  Europe,  Roman  Catholic,  Protestant,  and  Reformed ;  ex- 
cluding Russia,  with  Turkey,  from  the  European  concert;  divesting 
the  house  of  Austria  of  imperial  functions,  and  confining  these  to 
Spain,  with  the  Spanish- American  possessions;  dividing  Europe 
equally  between  fifteen  powers,  and  uniting  them  in  a  general  Council, 
somewhat  on  the  model  of  that  of  the  Amphictyons.  ' '  This  was  the 
meaning  of  that  modest  device  which  this  great  king  caused  to  be  in- 
scribed on  some  of  the  last  medals  that  were  struck  under  his  reign : 
*  Nil  sine  Concilio.'  "—[Memoirs  of  Sully ;  Edinburgh  ed. ,  1819 :  Vol.  5 : 
pp.  182-191. 

The  Abbe  St.  Pierre  had  been  present  at  the  conferences  at  Utrecht 
(a.d.  1718),  and  having  seen  the  difficulties  attending  the  settlement  of 
the  terms  of  peace  drew  up  the  Projet  de  Paix  perpetiteUe,  which,  with 
the  view  of  commending  it  to  attention,  he  attributed  to  Henry  Fourth 
and  Sully.  It  was  published  at  Utrecht  in  1713,  and  again  at  Paris  in 
1729,  and  "proposed  to  establish  a  perpetual  alliance  between  the  mem- 
bers of  the  European  league,  for  their  mutual  security  against  both 
foreign  and  civil  war,  and  for  the  mutual  guarantee  of  their  respective 
possessions,  and  of  the  treaties  concluded  at  Utrecht."  It  was  this  plan 
which  Dubois  called  one  of  "les  reves  d'un  homme  de  bien." 


626  APPENDIX. 

Rousseau's  plan  for  the  same  result,  published  in  1761,  was  based 
upon  that  of  St.  Pierre,  and  ascribed  to  him  the  honor  of  it. 

Bentham's  plan,  outlined  between  1786  and  1789,  contemplated  also 
"the  formation  of  a  general  league  of  European  states,  the  laws  of 
which  were  to  be  enacted  by  a  common  legislature,  and  carried  into 
effect  by  a  common  judicature,  but  without  providing  any  means  for 
preventiQg  this  league  from  falling  under  the  exclusive  influence  and 
control  of  its  more  powerful  members." 

Kant's  plan  was  published  in  1795,  and  was  grounded  on  the  same 
idea  of  a  general  confederation  of  European  nations.  In  his  conviction, 
"the  establishment  of  perpetual  peace,  to  take  the  place  of  these  mere 
suspensions  of  hostility  called  treaties  of  peace,  is  not  a  mere  chimera, 
but  a  problem,  of  which  time,  abridged  by  the  uniform  and  continual 
progress  of  the  human  mind,  wUl  ultimately  furnish  a  satisfactory  so- 
lution." 

A  full  synopsis  of  these  respective  plans  is  furnished  by  Wheaton  in 
his  "  History  of  the  Law  of  Nations":  New  York  ed.,  1845:  pp,  261-8, 
328-344,  750-754. — Leibnitz,  also,  the  man  who  'drove  all  sciences 
abreast,'  wrote  earnestly  on  the  subject. 

LIV. :  p.  206. — "Have  you  ever  read  a  paper  of  Lessing's  which 
alarms  inous  persons,  but  is  none  the  less  worthy  of  a  profound  philoso- 
phei" — '  Die  Erziehung  des  Menschengeschlechts '  ?  There  is  in  that  paper 
a  sentence  of  the  deepest  significance.  '  The  enthusiast,'  he  says,  '  and 
the  philosopher  are  frequently  only*  at  variance  as  to  the  epoch  in  the 
future  at  which  they  place  the  accomplishment  of  their  efforts. 
The  enthusiast  does  not  recognize  the  slowness  of  the  pace  of  time. 
An  event  not  immediately  connected  with  the  time  in  which  he  lives 
is  to  him  a  nullity. "  (Quoted  from  Niebuhr's  Life) . — [Savigny :  ' '  Pri- 
vate Intemat.  Law";  Edinburgh  ed.,  1880:  p.  540,  note. 

LV. :  p.  207. — "It  [the  Cliristian  Religion]  certainly  has  had  so  pow- 
erful an  effect  upon  it  [the  Law  of  Nations],  that  wherever  it  has  existed, 
it  has  gone  the  farthest  of  all  causes  to  introduce  notions  of  humanity 
and  true  justice  into  the  maxims  of  the  world.  The  great  proof  of  which 
is,  that  if  we  compare  the  conduct  of  Christian  nations  with  that  of 
nations  professing  any  other  religion,  whatever  may  be  their  stages  of 
improvement,  or  in  whatever  era  of  their  glory,  the  result  I  believe 
will  be  uniform  and  universal,  that  the  one  will  be  eminent  over  the 
other  for  regularity,  equity,  and  benevolence." — [Ward:  "Enquirjf 
into  Law  of  Nations";  London  ed.,  1795:  Vol.  2:  p.  2. 


NOTES  TO  LECTUEE  VII. 

Note  I. :  page  211. — The  familiar  sneer  of  Celsus  has  been  already 
quoted:  Lecture  TV. :  Note  XLIV.  In  another  passage,  not  there  cited, 
he  says- -still  imputing  it  to  Christians,  as  one  of  their  declarations— 
*  Wise  men  reject  what  we  say,  being  led  into  error,  and  ensnared  by 
their  wisdom." 

Origen's  quiet  reply  to  this  is  that,  "since  wisdom  is  the  knowledge  of 
divine  and  human  things,  and  of  their  causes,  no  one  who  was  really 
wise  would  reject  what  is  said  by  a  Christian  acquainted  with  the  prin- 
ciples of  Christianity,  or  would  be  led  into  error  or  ensnared  by  it." 
— [Origen,  adv.  Celsus :  lii. :  72. 

II. :  p.  213. — '*  Nobody  loves  discrepancy  for  the  sake  of  discrepancy. 
But  a  person  who  conscientiously  beheves  that  free  inquiry  is,  on  the 
whole,  beneficial  to  the  interests  of  truth,  and  that,  from  the  imper- 
fection of  the  human  faculties,  wherever  there  is  much  free  inquiry 
there  will  be  some  discrepancy,  may,  without  impropriety,  consider  such 
discrepancy,  though  in  itself  an  evil,  as  a  sign  of  good.  That  there  are 
ten  thousand  thieves  in  London  is  a  very  melancholy  fact.  But,  looked 
at  in  one  point  of  view,  it  is  a  reason  for  exultation.  For  what  other 
city  could  maintain  ten  thousand  thieves?  What  must  be  the  mass  of 
wealth,  where  the  fragments  gleaned  by  lawless  pilfering  rise  to  so 
large  an  amount  ?  St.  Kilda  would  not  support  a  single  pickpocket; 
and  just  as  we  may,  from  the  great  number  of  rogues  in  a  town,  infer 
that  much  honest  gain  is  made  there;  so  may  we  often,  from  the  quan- 
tity of  error  in  a  community,  draw  a  cheering  inference  as  to  the  de- 
gree in  which  the  public  mind  is  turned  to  those  inquiries  which  alone 
can  lead  to  rational  convictions  of  truth." — [Macaulay  :  "  Church  and 
State":  Works;  London  ed.,  1873:  Vol.  6:  p.  360. 

III.:  p.  214. — "Another  of  his  laws  was  [i.  e.,  of  Lycurgus,  the 
Athenian  orator,]  that  the  city  should  erect  statues  to  the  memory  of 
^schylus,  Sophocles,  and  Euripides;  and  their  tragedies,  being  fairly 
engrossed,  should  be  preserved  in  the  public  consistory,  and  that  the 
public  clerks  should  read  these  copies  as  the  plays  were  acted,  that 

^527) 


528  APPENDIX. 

nothiiig  niigh  t  be  changed  by  the  players ;  and  that  otherwise  it  should 
be  unlawful  to  ac;t  them." — [Plutarch:  "  Lives  of  Ten  Orators  " ;  vn. 

rV. :  p.  215. — The  first  epistle  of  Peter  is  quoted  from  abundantly  by 
Polycarp,  Irenaeus,  Clement  of  Alexandria,  Origen,  Tertullian  ;  and 
familiarity  with  it  plainly  appears  in  Clement  of  Rome.  It  was  in- 
cluded in  the  Syriac  Peshito.  It  was  numbered  by  Eusebius  among 
the  New  Testament  books  '  universally  acknowledged  as  genuine,'  with 
the  Acts,  the  first  epistle  of  John,  the  epistles  of  Paul,  and  the  '  holy 
quaternion  of  the  Gospels '  [H.  E.  III. :  25].  Even  Davidson  says  of  it: 
"  Conjectures  cannot  shake  the  credit  and  authority  of  the  epistle.  It 
is  firmly  established  as  an  undoubted  production  of  Peter"  ["  Irtrod. 
to  Now  Test.";  London  ed.,  1851:  Vol.  3:  p.  392]. 

v.:  p.  216.— "Who  could  have  written  it!  The  'great  Unknown 
One,'  who  has  been  suggested,  would  have  been  too  great  to  remain 
concealed.  He  would  have  stood  out  a  head  taller  than  all  the  great 
men  of  the  second  century.  There  is  no  room  in  the  second  century 
for  such  a  mind.  The  literature  of  that  century  has  an  utterly  differ- 
ent stamp  from  the  fourth  gospel.  The  writings  of  the  Apostolic 
Fathers  stand  in  dependence  upon  the  Apostolic  literature.  Simply 
read  the  letter  of  Polycarp,  who  was  such  an  honored  chief  in  the 
Christian  Church  of  Asia  IMinor,  and  see  what  a  great  falling  off  there 
IS.  .  .  It  [the  gospel]  points  to  an  earlier  stage,  a  stage  of  first  produc- 
tivity and  of  original  grandeur." — [Luthardt:  "St.  Jolin's  Gospel"; 
Edinburgh  ed.,  1876:  Vol.  1:  pp.  231-2. 

VI. :  p.  217. — "  The  Hymns,  constituting  the  bulk  of  the  four  coUec 
tions  known  as  Rig- Veda,  Sama-Veda,  Yajur-Veda,  and  Atharva-Veda, 
are  the  earliest  portion,  the  nucleus,  of  the  whole  sacred  canon,  the 
root  out  of  which  all  the  rest  has  grown.  They  are,  in  the  main,  the 
sacred  songs  with  which,  in  the  infancy  ot  Hindu  nationality,  at  the 
dawning  time  of  Hindu  culture,  before  the  origin  of  caste,  before  the 
birth  of  Qiva,  Vishnu,  or  Brahma,  before  the  rise  of  the  ceremonialism, 
the  pantheism,  the  superstition  and  idolatry  of  later  times,  the  ances- 
tors of  the  Hindu  people  praised  the  nature-gods  in  whom  they  be- 
lieved, and  accompanied  and  made  acceptable  their  offerings.  .  .  They 
are  hardly  less  an  authority  for  Indo-European  than  for  Indian  archaeol 
ogy  and  history.  This  is  especially  true  of  the  earliest  and  prmcipal 
collection,  the  Rig- Veda,  of  more  than  a  thousand  hymns,  and  more 
than  ten  thousand  stanzas ;  the  Sama-Veda  is  a  liturgical  selection  of 
verses  foimd  almost  wholly  in  the  former;  The  Yajur-Veda  is  an  as- 
semblage of  parts  of  hymns  and  ceremonial  formulas  used  in  the  sac- 
rifices, and  contains  much  prose,  and  much  matter  of  a  later  date^ 


N0TE8  TO  LECTURE  VII,  520 

mingled  with  its  more  ancient  portions;  while  the  Atharvan  is,  almost 
throughout,  of  a  more  modern  origin  and  of  an  inferior  character,  ana 
in  its  prose  passages  verges  nearly  upon  the  literature  of  the  second 
class. 

"  The  Brahmanas  diflPer  widely  from  the  Hymns,  in  form  and  spirit, 
and  are  of  a  notably  later  period.  They  grew  up  after  the  Hymna 
had  come  to  be  looked  upon  as  inspired  and  sacred.  .  .  The  Bmh- 
n^anas  are  in  prose;  they  were  brought  forth  in  the  schools  of  the 
Brahmanic  priesthood,  and  contain  the  lucubrations  of  the  leading 
-caste  upon  matters  theological  and  ceremonial:  dogma,  mythology, 
legend,  philosophy,  exegesis,  explication,  etymology,  are  confusedly 
mingled  together  in  their  pages.  While  they  contain  valuable  frag- 
ments of  thought  and  tradition,  they  are  in  general  tediously  discui> 
sive,  verbose,  and  artificial,  and  in  no  small  part  absolutely  puerile 
and  inane. "^[Prof.  W.  D.  Whitney:  "Oriental  and  Linguistic  Stud- 
ies ":  First  Series;  New  York  ed. :  pp.  66-68. 

Earth's  judgment  of  the  Veda  differs  somewhat  from  this: — "  In  it 
[the  Veda]  I  recognize  a  literature  that  is  preeminently  sacerdotal,  and 
La  no  sense  a  popular  one ;  and  from  this  conclusion  I  do  not,  as  is 
ordinarily  done,  except  even  the  Hymns,  the  most  ancient  of  the  docu- 
ments. Neither  in  the  language  nor  in  the  thought  of  the  Eig-Veda 
have  I  been  able  to  discover  that  quality  of  primitive  natural  simplic- 
ity which  so  many  are  fain  to  see  in  it.  The  poetry  it  contains  appears 
to  me,  on  the  contrary,  to  be  of  a  singularly  refined  character,  and  arti- 
ficiallj''  elaborated,  full  of  allusions  and  reticences,  of  pretensions  to 
mysticism  and  theosophic  insight ;  and  the  manner  of  its  expression  is 
such  as  reminds  one  more  frequently  of  the  phraseology  in  use  among 
certain  small  groups  of  initiated  than  the  poetic  language  of  a  large 
community.  .  .  The  Hymns,  as  I  have  already  remarked,  do  not  ap- 
pear to  me  to  show  the  least  trace  of  popular  derivation.  I  rather  im- 
agine that  they  emanate  from  a  narrow  circle  of  priests,  and  that  they 
reflect  a  somewhat  singular  view  of  things." — [A.  Barth:  "Religions 
of  India";  Boston  ed.,  1882:  Preface,  pp.  xiii,  xiv. 

"Further,  to  each  Veda  belong  different  Brahmanas,  treatises  of 
ritual  and  theology,  afterward  supplanted  by  the  '  Aranyakas,'  and 
the  ^  Upanishads, '  theological  -  philosophical  treatises,  prepared  more 
especially  for  the  use  of  the  hermits.  The  Brahmanas  contain  occa- 
sional elevated  thoughts,  and  not  a  few  antique  traditions  of  the  high- 
est importance,  but  they  are  in  other  respects  marked  by  narrow  for- 
malism, childish  mysticism,  and  superstitious  talk  about  all  kinds  of 
trifles."— [Tiele  :  "History  of  Religion";  Boston  ed.,  1881:  pp.  122-3. 

Of  the  same  books,  Max  Miiller  has  said: — "However  interesting  the 
Brahmanas  may  be  to  students  of  Indian  literature,  they  are  of  small 
Interest  to  the  general  reader.  The  greater  portion  of  them  is  simply 
34 


530  APPENDIX. 

twaddle,  and  what  is  worse,  theological  twaddle.  No  pei-son  who  ir 
not  acquainted  beforehand  with  the  place  which  the  Brahmanas  fill  in 
the  history  of  the  Indian  mind,  could  read  more  than  ten  pages  with- 
out being  disgusted."— ["Chips,  etc.";  New  York  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  1: 
p.  113. 

' '  There  is,  therefore,  in  the  Upanishads,  especially  in  those  of  less 
antiquity,  a  complete  theory  given  of  the  ecstatic  state,  and  the  means 
of  inducing  it ;  such  as  a  protracted  bodily  stillness,  a  stupefying  fixity 
<pf  look,  the  mental  repetition  of  strange  sets  of  formulae,  meditations 
on  the  unfathomable  mysteries  contained  in  certain  monosyllables^ 
such  as  the  famous  Om,  which  is  the  brahman  itself,  suppression  of 
the  breath,  a  succession  of  sleep-inducing  exercises,  by  which  they 
fancied  they  charmed  the  vital  spirits  into  the  thought,  the  thought 
into  the  soul,  concentrated  this  last  entirely  in  the  brain,  and  thence 
conveyed  it  back  into  the  heart,  where  the  supreme  atman  holds  his 
.seat.  .  .  Conscientiously  observed,  they  [such  exercises]  can  only  issue 
in  folly  and  idiocy ;  and  it  is  in  fact  under  the  image  of  a  fool  or  an 
idiot  that  the  wise  man  is  often  delineated  for  us,  in  the  Puranas,  for 
mstance.  "—[A.  Barth : '  *  Religions  of  India  " ;  Boston  ed. ,  1882 :  pp.  82-3. 

VII.  :  p.  217. — "The  collection  of  the  sacred  books  of  Buddhism 
bears  the  name  of  Tripitaka,  '  the  three  Baskets,'  since  it  is  formed  of 
three  minor  collections  :  that  of  the  Vinaya,  or  the  discipline,  which 
especially  resi)ects  the  clergy :  that  of  the  Sutras,  or  sermons  of  Bud- 
dha, containing  the  general  exposition  of  doctrine  ;  and  that  of  the 
Abhidharma,  or  the  metaphysics  of  the  system.  .  .  The  scheme  of 
this  [Buddha's]  doctrine  is  expounded  in  the  'four  noble  truths.' 
First,  the  existence  of  pain :  to  exist  is  to  sujBPer.  Second,  the  cause  of 
the  pain :  this  cause  is  to  be  found  in  desire,  which  increases  with  the 
gratification.  Third,  the  cessation  of  pain  :  this  cessation  is  possible  ; 
it  is  obtained  by  the  suppression  of  desire.  Fourth,  the  way  which 
leads  to  this  suppression :  this  way,  which  comprehends  four  stages  or 
successive  states  of  perfection,  is  the  knowledge  and  observance  of  the 
'  good  law,'  the  practice  of  the  discipline  of  Buddhism,  and  its  admira- 
ble morality.  The  end  of  this  is  Nirvana,  extinction,  the  cessation  of 
existence."— [Barth:  "Religions  of  India";  Boston  ed.,  1882:  pp.  102^ 
(note),  110. 

"  People  have  complained  of  the  length  of  the  sacred*  books  of  other 
nations,  but  there  are  none  that  approach  in  bulk  to  the  sacred  canon 
of  the  Thibetans.  It  consists  of  two  collections,  commonly  called  the 
*  Kanjur '  and  '  Tanjur.'  .  .  The  Kanjur  consists,  in  its  different  edi- 
tions, of  100,  102,  or  108  volumes  folio.  It  comprises  1,088  distinct 
works.  The  Tanjur  consists  of  225  volumes  folio,  each  weighing  from 
four  to  five  pounds  in  the  edition  of  Peking." — [Max  Miiller:  "  Chip^ 
etc.";  New  York  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  1:  p.  189. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  531 

VIII,:  p.  217. — "Kong-tse  [Confucius]  devoted  much  attention  to 
religious  literature.  He  studied  zealously  the  Yi-King,  an  obscure  book 
of  magic.  The  Shu-King,  a  historical  work,  was  perhaps  i-ecast  by 
liimself,  it  is  certainly  written  in  his  spirit.  The  Shi-king  is  a  collec- 
tion of  songs  chosen  by  him  out  of  a  large  number,  from  which  all 
mythological  expressions  have  probably  been  eliminated.  The  Li-ki,  a 
ritual  work,  was  enlarged  by  him.  These  books,  with  the  addition  of 
a  chronicle  written  entirely  by  him,  entitled  Tshiin  tsiew,  and  not  of 
a  religious  nature,  constitute  the  five  Kings,  regarded  by  the  followers 
of  Kong-fu-tse  as  the  canonical  books.  In  the  Liin-Yii  ['Analects'] 
the  remarkable  utterances  of  the  Master  addressed  to  his  followers 
were  collected  by  his  disciples'  disciples.  Others  attempted  in  the  Ta- 
hio  ['the  great  Learning']  and  the  Tshung-yimg  ['Doctrine  of  the 
Mean ']  to  supply  a  philosophical  basis  for  his  doctrine.  These  works 
form  three  of  the  four  Shu,  or  classical  books.  The  fourth,  compris- 
ing the  works  of  the  sage  Meng-tse,  was  added  to  the  collection  at  a 
much  later  period." — [Tiele:  "  History  of  Religion  " ;  Boston  ed.,  1881: 
p.  32. 

IX.:  p.  218. — "  The  majority  of  the  manuscripts  which  have  been 
recovered  from  the  [Egyptian]  tombs  contain  chapters  of  the  collection 
generally  known  under  the  title  of  the  Book  of  the  Dead.  .  .  Al- 
though the  prayers  are  as  a  rule  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  departed, 
they  were  certainly  recited  for  him  by  those  present  [at  the  burial]. 
Bubrics  at  the  end  of  several  chapters  attach  important  advantages  in 
the  next  world  to  the  accomplishment  of  what  has  been  prescribed  in 
the  foregoing  text.  .  .  The  Beatification  of  the  Dead  is  the  main  sub- 
ject of  every  chapter.  .  .  There  is  a  chapter,  with  a  vignette,  repre- 
senting the  soul  uniting  itself  to  the  body,  and  the  text  promises  that 
they  shall  never  again  be  separated.  The  use  of  his  mouth,  hands,  and 
other  limbs,  is  given  to  him.  There  is  a  series  of  chapters  relating  to 
the  restoration  and  protection  of  the  heart,  two  forms  of  which  are 
distinctly  and  repeatedly  mentioned.  The  next  eleven  chapters  have 
reference  to  combats  which  the  deceased  has  to  encounter  with  strange 
animals — crocodiles,  serpents,  tortoises — and  to  the  sacred  words  in 
virtue  of  which  he  may  confidently  rely  upon  success.  The  chapter 
for  repelling  all  reptiles  is  a  short  one :  '  O  Serpent  Rerek  !  advance 
not !  The  gods  Seb  and  Shu  are  my  protection :  stop  !  thou  who  hast 
eaten  the  rat  which  the  Sun-god  abhors,  and  hast  chewed  the  bones  of 
a  rotten  cat  ! '  .  .  From  rubbish  like  this,  which  is  only  worthy  of  the 
spells  of  vulgar  conjurors,  it  is  pleasant  to  pass  to  the  moral  doctrines 
of  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  which  are  the  same  which  were  recognized  in 
the  earliest  times.  No  one  could  pass  to  the  blissful  dwellings  of  the 
dead  who  had  failed  at  the  judgment  passed  in  presence  of  Osiris.   . 


532  APPENDIX. 

As  tlie  Book  of  the  Dead  is  the  most  ancient,  so  it  is  undoubtedly  the 
most  important  of  the  sacred  books  of  the  Egyptians.  Other  works 
are  interesting  to  the  archaeologist,  and  require  to  be  studied  by  those 
who  desire  to  have  minute  and  accurate  knowledge  of  the  entire  myth- 
ology, but  they  are  extremely  wearisome  and  repulsive  to  all  whose 
aim  extends  beyond  mere  erudition." — [Eenouf :  "Religion  of  Ancient 
Egypt";  New  York  ed.,  1880:  pp.  179-80, 187, 196,  201,  208. 

X. :  p.  218. — "  In  the  rivayats  of  the  Parsees  in  India,  i.  e.,  in  the 
-collections  of  tke  sayings  of  the  priests  on  their  doctrine,  we  find  an 
enumeration  of  these  sections  of  the  Scriptures,  According  to  thia 
enumeration,  the  Scriptures  of  Iran  consisted  of  twenty-one  books. 
The  first  book  contained  the  songs  of  praise  to  the  supreme  spirits  in 
33  chapters ;  the  second,  22  chapters,  treated  of  good  works ;  the  third, 
22  chapters,  of  the  sacred  word ;  the  fourth,  21  chapters,  of  the  gods ; 
the  fifth,  22  chapters,  of  the  earth,  of  water,  of  trees,  of  wild  animals ; 
etc.,  etc.  .  .  According  to  this  list,  the  Scriptures  of  Iran  must  have 
been  of  very  considerable  extent  [815  chapters].  .  .  The  Avritings  com- 
prised not  only  the  religious  doctrine  and  law,  together  with  the  rules 
for  correct  conversation,  but  also  the  rubrics  for  the  liturgy  and  the 
ritual.  They  were  at  the  same  time  the  code  of  criminal  and  civic 
law,  and  in  them  was  deposited  whatever  was  known  of  medicine,  and 
agriculture,  and  the  sum  total  of  the  science  of  their  autliors.  .  .  AH 
that  the  Parsees  of  India  now  possess  are  some  not  very  extensive  re- 
mains of  the  revision  of  the  sacred  Scriptures,  made  in  the  reign  of 
Shapur  II.  The  existing  part  of  the  laws  corresponds  in  the  title,  the 
divisions,  and  their  arrangements,  with  the  20th  book  [Haug  says  the 
19th]  of  the  text.  It  contains  the  rubrics  for  purification,  for  repelling 
and  removing  the  evil  spirits.  Obviously  this  book  was  regarded  as 
the  most  important  and  valuable  part  of  the  law,  and  to  this  circum- 
stance it  owes  its  preservation.  Besides  this,  we  have  invocations  and 
prayers,  chiefly  belonging  to  the  liturgy.  .  .  Among  the  existing  in- 
vocations of  the  Avesta  we  find  sacrificial  prayers  of  a  primitive  char- 
acter ;  but  the  greater  part  of  the  prayers  and  thanksgivings  are  with- 
out religious  feeling  or  poetical  power,  and  very  far  removed  from  the 
richness  and  abundance,  the  beauty  and  freshness  of  conception,  w^hich 
stream  through  the  majority  of  the  hymns  of  the  Veda.  .  .  Thus 
laudations  and  epithets  are  repeated  without  end.  A  good  many  of 
the  prayers  are  mere  nomenclatures,  and  repeat  the  same  forms  in  va- 
rying order«.  Some  are  to  be  said  a  hundred,  or  a  thousand  times." — 
[Duncker:  "History  of  Antiquity";  London  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  V.:  pp. 
61-53,  65,  99-100. 

"  Hitherto  the  Parsis  have  had  to  rely  upon  Europeans  for  all  ex- 
planations of  their  literature,  beyond  the  merely  traditional  learning 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  533 

of  their  priesthood."  [Of  the  Parsi  Scriptures,  written  in  the  ancient 
Bactrian  lan^iage,  the  remaining  Vendidad  extends  to  about  48,000 
words,  the  Yasna  to  39,000  words,  the  Visparad  to  3,300 — the  latter  not 
being  part  of  the  original  books.] — [Haug  :  "Essays  on  Sacred  Lan- 
guage and  Eeligion  of  Parsis";  London  ed.,  1878:  pp.  115,  65,  94-5. 

"  '  As  a  body, '  says  Mr.  Dadabhai  Naoroji,  '  the  priests  are  not  only 
Ignorant  of  the  duties  and  objects  of  their  own  profession,  but  are  en- 
tirely uneducated,  except  that  they  are  able  to  read  and  write,  and 
that,  also,  often  very  imperfectly.  They  do  not  understand  a  single 
word  of  their  prayers  and  recitations,  which  are  all  in  the  old  Zend 
language.'  .  .  .  The  Zend-Avesta  is  to  him  [the  Parsi]  a  sealed  book; 
and  though  there  is  a  Guzerati  translation  of  it,  that  translation  is  not 
made  from  the  original,  but  from  a  Pehlevi  paraphrase,  nor  is  it  recog- 
nized by  the  priests  as  an  authorized  version." — [IVCax  IMuller:  "  Chips, 
etc.";  New  York  ed.,  1881:  Vol.  1:  pp.  168-9. 

XI. :  p.  218. — "  This  book  [the  Quran]  is  held  in  the  highest  venera- 
tion by  IMuslims  of  every  sect.  When  being  read  it  is  kept  on  a  stand 
elevated  above  the  floor,  and  no  one  must  read  or  touch  it  without 
first  making  a  legal  ablution.  It  is  not  translated  unless  there  is 
the  most  urgent  necessity,  and  even  then  the  Arabic  text  is  printed 
with  the  translation.  .  .  On  that  night,  the  'night  of  power,'  the 
whole  Quran  is  said  to  have  descended  to  the  lowest  of  the  seven 
heavens,  from  whence  it  was  brought  piecemeal  to  IMuhammad  as  oc- 
casion required.  .  .  The  Muhammadan  historian,  Ibn  Khaldoun,  says 
on  this  point,  '  Of  all  the  divine  books  the  Quran  is  the  only  one  of 
which  the  text,  words,  and  phrases  have  been  communicated  to  a 
prophet  by  an  audible  voice.  It  is  otherwise  with  the  Pentateuch,  the 
Gospel,  and  the  other  divine  books;  the  prophets  received  them  under 
the  form  of  ideas.'  This  expresses  the  universal  belief  on  this  point — ^" 
a  belief  which  reveals  the  essentially  mechanical  nature  of  Islam. 
The  Quran,  thus  revealed,  is  now  looked  upon  as  the  standing  miracle 
of  Islam.  .  .  It  is  believed  to  be  a  miraculous  revelation  of  divine  elo- 
quence, as  regards  both  form  and  substance,  arrangement  of  words, 
and  its  revelation  of  sacred  things.  .  .  So  sacred  is  the  text  supposed 
to  be  that  only  the  Companions  of  the  Prophet  [those  who  were  in  con 
stant  intercourse  with  him]  are  deemed  worthy  of  being  commentators 
on  it.  The  revelation  itself  is  never  made  a  subject  of  investigation,  or 
tried  by  the  ordinary  rules  of  criticism.  .  .  The  letter  of  the  book  be- 
came, as  Mu'iammad  intended  it  should  become,  a  despotic  influence 
in  the  Muslim  world,  a  barrier  to  free  thinking  on  the  part  of  all  the 
orthodox,  an  obstacle  to  innovation  in  all  spheres — apolitical,  social, 
intellectual  and  moral.  .  .  That  there  should  be  a  human  as  well  as  a 
divine  side  to  inspiration  is  an  idea  not  only  foreign  but  absolutely  re 


534  appendij:. 

pugnant  to  Muhammadaiis.     The  Quran  is  not  a  book  of  principles.   I 
is  a  book  of  directions. 

'  While  as  the  world  rolls  on  from  age  to  age, 
And  realms  of  thought  expand, 
The  letter  stands  without  expanse  or  range, 
Stiff  as  a  dead  man's  hand.'  " 

[Edward  Sell:  "Faith  of  Islam";  London 
ed.,  1880:  pp.  2-9,  38,  47. 

XII.:  p.  218. — "A  spirit  of  divination,  and  a  certain  communion 
with  the  gods,  of  the  most  exalted  nature,  was  manifested — among 
women,  in  the  Sibyl,  and  among  men,  in  Melampodes  the  Greek, 
and  in  Marcius  the  Roman.  .  .  It  is  a  fact  acknowledged  by  all  writers, 
that  the  Sibyl  brought  three  books  to  Tarquinius  Superbus,  of  which 
two  were  burnt  by  herself,  while  the  third  perished  by  fire  with  the 
Capitol  in  the  days  of  Sylla  [B.C.  82]."— [Pliny:  Hist.  Nat.:  vil. :  33; 
XIII. :  27. 

"  In  that  year  [Volumnius  and  Sulpicius,  consuls]  the  sky  seemed 
to  be  on  fire ;  a  violent  earthquake  also  occuiTed ;  it  was  believed  that 
an  ox  spoke ;  among  other  prodigies  it  rained  flesh,  also.  .  .  The  books 
were  consulted  by  the  duumviri  for  sacred  rites ;  dangers  of  attack  be- 
ing made  on  the  highest  parts  of  the  city,  and  of  bloodshed  resulting, 
were  predicted  as  about  to  come  from  an  assemblage  of  strangers: 
among  other  things,  an  admonition  was  given  that  all  intestine  dis- 
turbances should  be  avoided.  .  .  The  severe  winter,  whether  from 
the  ill  temperature  of  the  air  by  reason  of  the  abrupt  transition  to  the 
contrary  state  [from  cold  to  heat],  or  from  whatever  other  cause,  was  fol 
lowed  by  an  unhealthy  summer,  destructive  to  all  species  of  animals ; 
and  when  neither  the  cause  nor  the  end  of  this  intractable  pestilence 
•could  be  discovered,  the  Sibylline  Books  were  consulted,  according  to 
a  decree  of  the  Senate." — [Livy:  Histor. :  ill.:  10;  v.  13. 

' '  We  may  safely  adopt  Varro's  account  that  they  were  written  on 
palm-leaves,  partly  in  verses,  partly  in  symbolical  hieroglyphics.  Their 
nature  being  such,  we  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  manner  of  consulting 
them.  To  have  searched  after  a  passage  and  applied  it,  would  have 
been  presumptuous.  The  form  of  the  Indian  palm-leaves  used  in 
writing,  oblongs  cut  to  the  same  size,  was  well  suited  to  their  being 
shuffled  and  drawn.  Thus  the  practice  at  Praeneste  was  to  draw  a  tab- 
let."—[Niebuhr:  "Hist,  of  Rome";  London  ed. ,  1851 :  Vol.  1:  p.  504 

"  The  supposed  Erythraean  Sibyl,  and  the  earliest  collection  of  Sibyl- 
line prophecies,  afterwards  so  much  multiplied  and  interpolated,  and 
referred  (according  to  Grecian  custom)  to  an  age  even  earlier  than 
Homer,  appear  to  belong  to  a  date  not  long  posterior  to  Epimenides. 
Other  oracular  verses,  such  as  those  of  Bakis,  were  treasured  up  ii 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIl.  585 

Athens  and  other  cities ;  the  sixth  century  before  the  Christian  era  was 
fertile  in  these  kinds  of  religious  manifestations/' — [Grote:  "History 
of  Greece";  London  ed.,  1872:  Vol.  1:  p.  2Q. 

Xin. :  p.  219. — In  the  life  of  Apollonius,  by  Philostratus,  he  is 
represented  as  an  incarnation  of  the  god  Proteus ;  born  amid  the  sing- 
ing of  swans,  and  beneath  the  extraordinary  fall  and  rise  of  a  meteoi 
in  the  air ;  as  living  on  fruit  and  vegetables  alone,  and  keeping  him 
self  pure  from  vice  ;  as  stilling  riotous  assemblies  by  his  presence  ; 
speaking  in  short  and  adamantine  sentences,  with  a  tone  of  high  au- 
thority ;  as  knowing  the  languages  of  barbarians,  and  of  animals,  utter- 
ing prophecies,  working  miracles,  declaring  what  was  at  the  moment 
<x5curring  at  a  distance  ;  as  tried  before  the  emperor  Domitian,  and 
suddenly  vanishing  from  before  the  tribunal,  and  appearing  at  Puteoli. 
He  taught,  according  to  his  biographer,  the  immortality  of  the  soul ; 
and  he  finally  disappeared  from  the  world  in  the  temple  of  Diana  at 
Crete,  while  the  temple  resounded  with  the  song  of  many  virgins, 
saying,  '  Leave  the  earth,  and  come  to  Heaven.' 

' '  Why,  then,  O  senseless  one,  does  no  one  worship  Apollonius  as  a 
God  ? "  is  the  sharp  question  with  which  Lactantius  lets  in  the  light 
on  the  universal  incredulity  before  the  elaborate  art  of  Philostratus. 
[Div.  Inst. :  V.  3.] 

The  life  of  Apollonius  was  translated  into  English  by  Charles  BloTmt, 
in  the  interest  of  Deism,  a.d.  1680,  and  was  accompanied  with  notes 
generally  attributed  to  Lord  Herbert  of  Cherbury,  one  of  the  most 
cultured  and  thoughtful  of  English  sceptics.  It  has  been  since  trans- 
lated by  Rev.  Edward  Berwick. 

The  work  attributed  to  Porphyry,  on  the  philosophy  of  oracles,  is 
quoted  from  as  genume,  by  Eusebius  largely,  by  Theodoret,  Augustine, 
and  othei's ;  and  is  accepted  as  his  by  Mosheim,  Neander,  A.  S.  Farrar 
["  Critical  History  of  Free  Thought"],  and  by  many  others.  But  Dr. 
Lardner  [Works:  London  ed.,  1829:  Vol.  VII.:  pp.  444-467:]  argues 
against  its  genuineness  with  earnestness,  and  at  length. 

XIV. :  p.  220. — "Wherefore  in  the  Old  Testament  there  is  a  veiling 
of  the  New,  in  the  New  Testament  there  is  an  unveiling  of  the  Old." — 
[Augustine :  on  "  Catechizing  of  the  Unlearned  " :  8. 

XV. :  p.  222.— "  I  have  made  these  remarks  in  reply  to  the  charges 
which  Celsus  and  others  bring  against  the  simplicity  of  the  language 
of  Scripture,  which  appears  to  be  thrown  into  the  shade  by  the  splen- 
dour of  polished  discourse.  For  our  pix)phets,  and  Jesus  Himself,  and 
His  apostles,  were  careful  to  adopt  a  style  of  address  which  should  no\ 
merely  convey  the  truth,  but  which  should  be  fitted  to  gain  over  tlie 


d36  appendix. 

multitude,  until  each  one,  attracted  and  led  onwards,  should  ascend  a» 
far  as  he  could  towards  the  comprehension  of  those  mysteries  which 
are  contained  in  these  apparently  simple  words.  For,  if  I  may  venture  to 
say  so,  few  have  been  benefited,  if  they  have  indeed  been  benefited  at  all, 
by  the  beautiful  and  polished  style  of  Plato,  and  those  who  have  writ- 
ten like  him;  while,  on  the  contrary,  many  have  received  advantage 
from  those  who  wrote  and  taught  in  a  simple  and  practical  manner, 
and  with  a  view  to  the  wants  of  the  multitude." — [Origen:  adv.  Cel- 
Bus ;  VI. :  2. 

XVI. :  p.  222. — "The  Pagan  moralists  lack  life  and  colour,  and  even 
the  noble  Stoic,  Marcus  Antoninus,  is  too  high  and  refined  for  an  ordi- 
nary child.  Take  the  Bible  as  a  whole ;  make  the  severest  deductions 
which  fair  criticism  can  dictate  for  shortcomings  and  positive  errors ; 
eliminate,  as  a  sensible  lay-teacher  would  do,  if  left  to  himself,  all  that  it 
is  not  desirable  for  children  to  occupy  themselves  with ;  and  there  still 
remains  in  this  old  literature  a  vast  residuum  of  moral  beauty  and 
grandeur.  And  then  consider  the  great  historical  fact  that,  for  three 
centuries,  this  book  has  been  woven  into  the  life  of  all  that  is  best  and 
noblest  in  English  history;  that  it  has  become  the  national  epic  of 
Britain,  and  is  as  familiar  to  noble  and  simple,  from  John-o'-Groat's 
House  to  Land's  End,  as  Dante  and  Tasso  once  were  to  the  Italians; 
that  it  is  written  in  the  noblest  and  purest  English,  and  abounds  in  ex- 
quisite beauties  of  mere  literary  form ;  and,  finally,  that  it  forbids  the 
veriest  hind  who  never  left  his  village  to  be  ignorant  of  the  existence 
of  other  countries  and  other  civilizations,  and  of  a  great  past,  stretching 
back  to  the  furthest  limits  of  the  oldest  nations  in  the  world.  By  the 
study  of  what  other  book  could  children  be  so  much  humanized,  and 
made  to  feel  that  each  figure  in  that  vast  historical  procession  fills,  like 
themselves,  but  a  momentary  space  in  the  interval  between  two  eter- 
nities ;  and  earns  the  blessings  or  the  curses  of  all  tim§,  according  to 
its  effort  to  do  good  and  hate  evil,  even  as  they  also  are  earning  their 
payment  for  their  work  ? " — [Prof.  Huxley  :  * '  Critiques  and  Addresses  " ; 
New  York  ed.,  1882  :  p.  51. 

Prof.  Huxley  has  recently  reaffirmed,  with  emphasis,  this  conviction 
of  the  preeminent  value  of  the  Bible,  as  an  instrument  of  popular 
education. 

XVII. :  p.  223. — "View  it  in  what  light  we  may,  the  Bible  is  a  very 
surprisiQg  phenomenon.  .  .  This  collection  of  books  has  taken  such  a 
hold  on  the  world  as  has  no  other.  The  literature  of  Greece,  which 
goes  up  like  incense  from  that  land  of  temples  and  heroic  deeds,  has 
not  half  the  influence  of  this  book  from  a  nation  alike  despised  in  an- 
cient and  modern  times.    In  all  the  temples  of  Christendom  is  it» 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIL  637 

voice  lifted  up,  week  by  week.  The  sun  never  sets  on  its  gleaming 
page.  It  goes  equally  to  tlie  cottage  of  the  plain  man  and  the  palace 
of  the  king.  It  is  woven  into  the  literature  of  the  scholar,  and  it  colors 
the  talk  of  the  street.  .  .  It  blesses  us  when  we  are  born ;  gives  name3 
to  half  Christendom ;  rejoices  with  us ;  has  sympathy  for  our  mom-n- 
ing ;  tempers  our  grief  to  finer  issues.  It  is  the  better  part  of  our  ser- 
mons. It  lifts  man  above  himself  ;  our  best  of  uttered  prayers  are  in 
its  storied  speech,  wherewith  our  fathers  and  the  patriarchs  prayed.  The 
timid  man,  about  awaking  from  this  dream  of  life,  looks  through  the 
glass  of  Scripture,  and  his  eye  grows  bright ;  he  does  not  fear  to  stand 
alone,  to  tread  the  way  unknown  and  distant,  to  take  the  death-angel 
by  the  hand,  and  bid  farewell  to  wife,  and  babes,  and  home.  .  .  Some 
thousand  famous  writers  come  up  in  this  century,  to  be  forgotten  in 
the  next.  But  the  silver  cord  of  the  Bible  is  not  loosed,  nor  its  golden 
bowl  broken,  as  Time  chronicles  his  tens  of  centuries  passed  by.  Has 
the  human  race  gone  mad  ?  .  .  It  is  only  a  heart  that  can  speak,  deep 
and  true,  to  a  heart ;  a  mind  to  a  mind ;  a  soul  to  a  soul ;  wisdom  to 
the  wise,  and  religion  to  the  pious.  There  must  then  be  in  the  Bible 
mind,  heart,  and  soul,  wisdom  and  rehgion.  Were  it  otherwise,  how 
could  millions  find  it  their  lawgiver,  friend,  and  prophet  ?  Some  of 
the  greatest  of  human  institutions  seem  built  on  the  Bible ;  such  things 
will  not  stand  on  heaps  of  cha£F,  but  on  mountains  of  rock." — [Theo- 
dore Parker  :  "Discourse  of  Religion";  Boston  ed. ,  1843  :  pp.  317-320. 

XVin. :  p.  224:. — "In  consequence  of  such  a  social  condition,  the 
Latin  stock  in  Italy  im.derwent  an  alarming  diminution,  and  its  fair 
provinces  were  overspread  partly  by  parasitic  immigrants,  partly  by 
sheer  desolation.  .  .  It  is  a  dreadful  picture — this  picture  of  Rome 
under  the  rule  of  the  oligarchy.  There  was  nothing  to  bridge  over  or 
soften  the  fatal  contrast  between  the  world  of  the  beggars  and  the 
world  of  the  rich.  The  more  clearly  and  painfully  this  contrast  was 
felt  on  both  sides — the  giddier  the  height  to  which  riches  rose,  the 
deeper  the  abyss  of  poverty  yawned — the  more  frequently,  amidst  that 
changeful  world  of  speculation  and  playing  at  hazard,  were  individ- 
uals tossed  from  the  bottom  to  the  top,  and  again  from  the  top  to  the 
bottom.  .  .  Riches  and  misery,  in  close  league,  drove  the  Italians  out 
of  Italy,  and  filled  the  peninsula  partly  with  swarms  of  slaves,  partly 
with  awful  silence." — [Mommsen:  "History  of  Rome";  New  York 
ed.,  1868  :  Vol.  4  :  pp.  619-21. 

XIX. :  p.  225. — "In  those  Protestant  countries  whose  churches  were 
not,  as  the  Church  of  England  always  was,  principally  political  insti- 
tutions— in  Scotland,  for  example,  and  in  the  New  England  States— 
an  amount  of  education  was  carried  down  to  the  poorest  of  the  people 


538  APPENDIX. 

of  whicli  there  is  no  other  example;  every  peasant  expounded  the 
Bible  to  his  family,  (many  to  their  neighbours,)  and  had  a  mind  prac- 
tised in  meditation  and  discussion  on  all  the  points  of  his  i*eligioua 
creed.  The  food  may  not  have  been  the  most  nourishing,  but  we  can- 
not be  blind  to  the  sharpening  and  strengthening  exercise  which  such 
great  topics  gave  to  the  understanding — the  discipline  in  abstraction  and 
reasoning  which  such  mental  occupation  brought  down  to  the  humblest 
layman,  and  one  of  the  consequences  of  which  was  the  privilege  long 
enjoyed  by  Scotland  of  supplying  the  greater  part  of  Europe  with  pro- 
fessors for  its  universities,  and  with  educated  and  skilled  workmen  for 
its  practical  arts." — [J.  S.  Mill :  "Philosophy  of  Comte";  Boston  ed., 
1866  :  p.  103  (note). 

The  same  general  influence  appeared  very  early  in  the  Church. 
.Thus  it  is  an  interesting  fact,  full  of  suggestion,  that  what  were  long 
supposed  to  be  instruments  of  torture  preserved  or  pictured  in  the  cella 
of  martyrs  in  the  catacombs,  have  proved,  when  more  critically  ex- 
amined, to  be  only  the  instruments  of  daily  labor,  the  figures  of  which 
were  preserved  in  loving  remembrance  of  the  humble  mechanics  whose 
faith  was  honored  and  their  memory  cherished  in  the  caverns  which 
held  their  ashes.  So  the  confessors  of  His  religion  who  wrought  at 
Nazareth,  and  of  whom  the  tent-maker  had  gloriously  preached,  hon- 
ored labor  from  the  beginning,  and  felt  that  the  useful  arts  of  life  had 
taken  a  new  and  a  Divine  consecration. — [See  Pressense  :  "Early 
Years  of  Christianity";  London  ed.,  1880  :  Vol.  4  :  pp.  446,  497,  499. 

Compare  the  philosophical  disdain  of  the  humbler  industries,  which 
were  usually  committed  to  slaves,  and  were  almost  confused  with  things 
immoral,  as  exemplified  by  Cicero : — 

"  The  gains  of  hired  workmen  are  ignoble  and  dirty,  and  of  all  whose 
labor  is  purchased  rather  than  their  skill.  For  wages  themselves  be- 
come to  such  but  the  hire  of  servitude.  Also  they  are  to  be  accounted 
mean  who  buy  from  other  merchants  what  they  in  turn  may  quickly 
sell.  For  they  make  no  profit  unless  they  lie  abundantly ;  while  noth- 
ing is  baser  than  such  lying.  And  all  handicraftsmen  are  engaged  in 
vulgar  business;  nor  can  a  workshop  have  in  it  anything  suitable  to  a 
gentleman  [ingenuum].  And  least  of  all  are  those  employments  to  "be 
approved  which  minister  to  men's  sensual  pleasures:  such  as  'fish- 
mongers, butchers,  cooks,  poulterers,  fishermen,'  as  Terence  recites 
them.  Add  to  these  also,  if  you  please,  perfumers,  dancers,  and  the 
whole  tribe  of  dice-house  keepers." — pDe  Officiis  :  I. :  42. 

XX. :  p.  225.—"  It  is  in  point  to  notice  also  the  structure  and  style 
of  Scripture,  a  structure  so  unsystematic  and  various,  and  a  style  so 
figurative  and  indirect,  that  no  one  would  presume  at  first  sight  to  say 
what  is  in  it  and  what  is  not.    It  cannot,  as  it  were,  be  mapped,  or  ita 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  539 

contents  catalogued  ;  but,  after  all  our  diligence,  to  the  end  of  our 
lives  and  to  the  end  of  the  Church,  it  must  be  an  unexplored  and  un- 
subdued land,  with  heights  and  valleys,  forests  and  streams,  on  the 
right  and  left  of  our  path  and  close  about  us,  full  of  concealed  wonders 
and  choice  treasures." — [J.  H.  Newman:  "  Essay  on  Devel.  of  Christ, 
Doctrine";  London  ed.,  1878:  p.  71. 

"  Theological  inquiries  are  no  part  of  my  present  subject;  but  I  can? 
not  refrain  from  adding,  that  the  collection  of  tracts  which  we  call  from 
their  excellence  the  Scriptures,  contain,  independently  of  a  divine 
origin,  more  true  sublimity,  more  exquisite  beauty,  purer  morality, 
more  important  history,  and  finer  strains  both  of  poetry  and  eloquence, 
than  could  be  collected  within  the  same  compass  from  all  other  books 
that  were  ever  composed  in  any  age  or  in  any  idiom." — [Sir  "William 
Jones:  Works;  London  ed.,  1807:  Vol.  3:  p.  183. 

"  Let  one  consider  the  marvels  of  the  holy  Scripture,  which  are  end- 
less; the  grandeur  and  sublimity,  beyond  everything  human,  of  the 
matters  which  they  contain,  and  the  admirable  simplicity  of  the  style,  in 
which  is  nothing  affected,  nothing  studied,  and  which  bears  the  char- 
acteristic marks  of  truth  that  no  one  can  deny.  .  .  Jesus  Christ 
speaks  the  grandest  things  so  simply  that  it  seems  as  if  he  had  not 
thought  of  them,  but  nevertheless  so  precisely  and  perspicuously  that 
one  sees  clearly  what  his  reflection  upon  them  has  been.  This 
clearness,  united  with  this  artlessness,  is  admirable.  .  .  Men  sim- 
ple, and  without  strength,  like  the  apostles  and  early  Christians,  re- 
sisted all  the  powers  of  the  world,  subdued  kings,  learned  men  and 
philosophers,  and  destroyed  the  idolatry  so  firmly  established.  And 
the  wliole  was  accomplished  by  the  mere  force  of  that  word  which 
Christ  had  preached." — [Pascal:  "Pensees:  Sec.  par.,  Arts.  iv. :  12; 
X. :  4;  xi. :  2. 

"The  sciences  are  flourishing  to-day,  and  literature  and  the  arts 
shine  brilliantly  among  us.  But  what  profit  does  religion  derive  from 
it  ?  Our  libraries  are  crowded  with  books  of  theology,  and  casuists 
abound  among  us.  Formerly  we  had  saints,  and  had  not  casuists. 
Now  science  expands,  and  faith  ceases.  .  .  It  was  not  with  all  this  art 
and  apparatus  that  the  Gospel  extended  itself  throughout  the  world, 
and  that  its  ravishing  beauty  impenetrated  men's  hearts.  This  Divine 
book,  the  only  book  indispensable  for  the  Christian,  only  needs  to  be 
meditated  upon  to  carry  into  the  soul  the  love  of  its  Author,  and  the 
desire  to  fulfil  his  precepts.  Never  has  virtue  spoken  a  language  so 
delightful.  Never  has  the  prof oundest  wisdom  expressed  itself  at  once 
with  so  much  of  energy,  and  with  so  much  of  simplicity.  One  cannot 
quit  the  reading  without  feeling  himself  better  than  before." — [J.  J. 
Rousseau:  "Melanges":  GEuvres ;  Paris  ed.,  1793:  Tom.  XIV.: 
pp.  268-9. 


540  APPENDIZ. 

*'  I  confess  to  you  that  the  majesty  of  the  Scriptures  amazes  me,  the 
holiness  of  the  Gospel  speaks  to  my  heart!  See  the  books  of  the  phi- 
losophers, with  all  their  pomp,  how  petty  they  are  beside  this !  Can  it 
be  that  a  Book  at  once  so  sublime  and  so  simple,  has  been  the  work  ol 
man  ?  Can  it  be  that  he  whose  history  it  presents  was  himseK  cnly  a 
Man  ?  "—[J.  J.  Rousseau ;  Paris  ed. ,  1793.  ' '  Emile  " ;  GEuvres ;  Tom. 
IX. :  p.  40. 

' '  The  Bible  alone  contains  a  science  of  realities ;  and  therefore  each 
of  its  elements  is  at  the  same  time  a  living  germ,  in  which  the  present 
involves  the  future,  and  in  the  finite  the  infinite  exists  potentially.  .  . 
Oh,  what  a  mine  of  undiscovered  treasures,  what  a  new  world  of  power 
and  truth,  would  the  Bible  promise  to  our  future  meditation,  if  in  some 
gracious  moment  one  solitary  text  of  all  its  inspired  contents  should 
but  daAvn  upon  us  in  the  pure  untroubled  brightness  of  an  idea,  that  most 
glorious  birth  of  the  God-like  within  us,  which,  even  as  the  light,  its 
material  symbol,  reflects  itself  from  a  thousand  surfaces,  and  flies  home- 
ward to  its  Parent  Mind,  enriched  with  a  thousand  forms,  itself  above 
form,  and  still  remaining  in  its  own  simplicity  and  identity." — [Cole- 
ridge: Works;  New  York  ed.,  1853;  Vol.  1:  pp.  450-1. 

XXI.  :  p.  225. — "His  [Paul's]  thought  is  everywhere  penetrated 
with  an  intense  heat,  leavened  with  lightning,  that  fuses  the  mass 
containing  it,  and  runs  off  alive  for  other  media  to  hold  it.  The  revela- 
tion to  him  of  Christ  in  heaven  set  in  action  all  the  resources  of  his 
nature,  and  gave  them  a  preternatural  tension.  .  .  And  so  much  is 
the  Apostle's  later  exposition  of  his  hope  divested  of  what  is  special  to 
himseK,  that  to  all  ages  since  it  has  struck  upon  the  ear  of  mourners 
along  with  the  very  toll  of  the  funeral  bell ;  and,  though  often  indis- 
tinct to  their  mind,  it  has  jarred  with  no  falsehood  on  their  heart,  but 
sounded  like  an  anthem  in  the  dark — great  music  and  dim  words." — 
[James  Martineau :  '*  Studies  of  Christianity  " ;  Boston  ed.,  1866 :  p.  460. 

F.  C.  Baur  seems  to  many  to  have  done  scanty  justice  to  the  tender 
and  magnificent  spirit  of  Paul,  but  few  have  seen  with  clearer  eye  the 
secret  of  his  native  intellectual  energy : — 

"  The  great  distinguishing  characteristic  which  appears  everywhere 
in  the  Apostle's  writings  is  the  innate  impulse,  springing  from  the  very 
roots  of  his  nature,  towards  rational  speculative  contemplation.  .  . 
The  more  we  penetrate  into  the  process  of  thought  in  the  Apostle's 
writmgs,  the  more  minutely  we  analyze  his  mode  of  argument,  the 
method  of  his  development  and  representation,  the  more  shall  we  be 
convinced  that  his  is  a  thoroughly  dialectical  nature.  .  .  The  Apostle's 
whole  repi*esentation,  religious  as  it  is,  is  filled  to  overflowing  with  the 
forms  and  elements  of  thought;  it  is  not  only,  what  is  commonly 
recognized  as  the  great  merit  of  the  Apostle's  writings,  that  thought 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  541 

follows  hard  on  thought ;  more  than  this,  thoughts  succeed  each  other 
as  determinations  and  momenta  of  some  one  conception  that  is  greater 
than  all  of  them ;  the  thought  unfolds  itself,  brings  forth  its  own  con- 
tents out  of  its  own  depths,  and  determines  itseK  by  taking  up  its  own 
momenta.  Hence  the  peculiar  stamp  of  the  Apostle's  language ;  it  is 
distinguished  on  the  one  hand  for  precision  and  compression ;  on  the 
other  hand  it  is  marked  by  a  harshness  and  roughness  which  suggest 
that  the  thought  is  far  too  weighty  for  the  language,  and  can  scarcely 
find  fit  terms  for  the  superabundant  matter  it  would  fain  express." — 
["Paul,  the  Apostle  of  Jesus  Christ " ;  London  ed.,  1875:  Vol.  2:  pp. 
275-281. 

"  Every  one  who  has  been  at  Rome  has  been  taken  to  see  the  Church 
of  St.  Paul,  rebuilt  after  a  destruction  by  fire  forty  years  ago.  The 
church  stands  a  mile  or  two  out  of  the  city,  on  the  way  to  Ostia  and 
the  desert.  The  interior  has  all  the  costly  magnificence  of  Italian 
churches ;  on  the  ceiling  is  written  in  gilded  letters :  '  Doctor  Gen- 
tium.''^ Gold  glitters  and  marbles  gleam,  but  man  and  his  movement 
are  not  there.  The  traveller  has  left  at  a  distance  the  fumum  et  opes 
strepitumque  Bomce;  around  him  reigns  solitude.  There  is  Paul,  with 
the  mystery  which  was  hidden  from  ages  and  from  generations,  which 
was  uncovered  by  him  for  some  half  score  years,  and  which  then  was 
buried  with  him  in  his  grave !  Not  in  our  day  will  he  relive,  with  his 
incessant  effort  to  find  a  moral  side  for  miracle,  with  his  incessant 
effort  to  make  the  intellect  follow  and  secure  all  the  workings  of  the 
religious  perception.  Of  those  who  care  for  religion,  the  multitude  of 
us  want  the  materialism  of  the  Apocalypse ;  the  few  want  a  vague  re- 
ligiosity. .  .  The  doctrine  of  Paul  will  arise  out  of  the  tomb  where  for 
centuries  it  has  lain  buried.  It  will  edify  the  church  of  the  future ;  it 
will  have  the  consent  of  happier  generations,  the  applause  of  less 
superstitious  ages.  All  will  be  too  little  to  pay  half  the  debt  which 
the  church  of  God  owes  to  this  '  least  of  the  apostles,  who  was  not  fit 
to  be  called  an  apostle,  because  he  persecuted  the  church  of  God.'  " — 
[Matthew  Arnold:  "St.  Paul  and  Protestantism";  New  York  ed., 
1883:  pp.  98-9. 

XXII.  :  p.  226. — The  distinction  which  Goethe  sharply  draws  be- 
tween the  Prophet  and  the  Poet  is  no  doubt  generally  correct : — 

"If  now  we  wish  strictly  to  define  the  difference  between  Poets  and 
Prophets,  we  say  this :  both  are  seized  and  inspired  by  one  God ;  but 
the  Poet  squanders  the  gift  bestowed  on  him  in  enjoyment,  to  produce 
enjoyment,  to  reach  fame,  or  at  any  rate  a  pleasant  life,  through  that 
which  he  gives  forth ;  every  other  aim  he  neglects ;  he  seeks  to  be  mani- 
fold, to  show  himself  unhmited  in  mind  and  in  performance.  The 
Prophet,  on  the  otlior  hand,  looks  only  to  a  single  definite  end,  to  at- 


5-1:2  APPENDIX. 

tain  wliich  he  avails  himself  of  the  simplest  means.  Xt  all  times  some 
doctrine  must  he  proclaim,  hy  which,  and  around  which,  as  a  standard,, 
he  may  gather  the  peoples.  To  him  it  is  only  needful  that  the  world 
shall  believe ;  he  must  therefore  become  and  continue  to  be  monoto 
nous,  since  one  does  not  exercise  faith  in  the  manifold,  he  discerns  it/" 
— [West-ostlich.  Divan  (Abhandlung)  :  Werke ;  Stuttgart,  1867 :  Band 
XIV. :  S.  146. 

Compare  with  this  the  words  of  Stanley  concerning  the  latter  portion 
of  the  Book  of  Isaiah : — 

"Those  six  and  twenty  chapters  of  the  Book  of  Isaiah — the  most 
deeply  inspired,  the  most  tinily  Evangelical  of  any  portion  of  the  Pro- 
phetical writings,  whatever  be  their  date,  and  whoever  then'  author — 
take  their  stand  on  the  times  of  the  Captivity,  and  from  thence  look 
forward  from  the  summit  of  the  last  ridge  of  the  Jewish  history  into 
the  remotest  future,  unbroken  now  by  any  intervening  barrier.  .  .  In 
the  foreground  of  the  future  stands  not  the  Euler,  or  Conqueror,  but 
the  'Servant'  of  Grod,  gentle,  purified,  suffering — whether  it  be  Cyrus, 
whom  He  had  anointed,  .  .  or  One,  more  sorrowful,  more  triumph- 
ant, more  human,  more  divine,  than  any  of  these,  the  last  and  true 
fulfilment  of  the  most  spiritual  hopes  and  the  highest  aspii'ations  of  the 
Chosen  People.  In  the  remoter  horizon  is  the  vision  of  a  gradual 
amelioration  of  the  whole  human  race,  to  be  accomplished  not  solely  or 
chiefly  by  the  seed  of  Israel,  but  by  those  outlying  nations  which  were 
but  just  beginning  to  take  their  place  in  the  world's  history.  In  the 
strains  of  triumph  which  welcome  the  influx  of  these  Gentile  stran- 
gers, we  recognize  the  prelude  of  the  part  which  in  the  coming  fortunes 
of  the  Jewish  Church  is  to  be  played  not  only  by  Cyrus,  and  if  so  be  by 
Zoroaster,  but  by  Socrates  and  Plato,  by  Alexander  and  by  Caesar.  .  . 
This  is  the  dawn  of  the  new  epoch  of  Jewish  and  of  universal  history  •, 
full  of  misgivings  and  doubts,  such  as  have  beset  every  great  revolu- 
tion m  human  opinions  and  institutions.  But  in  the  chill  of  that  new 
dawn,  amidst  the  perplexities  of  that  untried  situation,  amidst  the  ruins 
of  those  ancient  empires,  in  the  eager  expectation  of  those  unknown 
changes — the  first  words  which  break  the  silence,  and  of  which  the 
strains  echo  through  the  whole  of  the  next  period  of  the  history,  and 
through  its  endless  consequences,  are  those  of  the  mighty  and  mysterious 
Teacher,  Prophet  and  Psalmist  both  in  one ;  the  key-note  not  only  of 
the  revived  and  transformed  Israel,  but  of  the  rising  world  of  Asia  and 
Europe,  and  of  the  Christendom  of  a  still  remoter  future: — 'Comfort 
ye,  comfort  ye,  my  people.'  " — ["  Hist,  of  Jewish  Church  ":  Part  II. ; 
New  York  ed.,  1868:  pp.  637,  641-2. 

"That  it  [the  Prophetic  gift]  now  rose  again  in  Samuel  with  fresh 
force,  so  that  while  still  a  child,  according  to  the  beautiful  tradition, 
he  was  seized  repeatedly  and  ever  more  irresistibly  by  the  clear  voic* 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIL  543 

of  Jalive,  and  that  then  all  Israel  with  pure  confidence  accustomed 
itself  again  to  the  higher  guidance  of  genuine  prophecy — this  is  here 
first  of  all  a  thing  so  great,  and  at  the  same  time  so  novel,  as  ^ad  not 
appeared  since  the  days  of  Moses.  The  deepest  and  most  powerful  force 
in  the  commonwealth,  even  the  Prophetic,  which  alone  could  not  only 
save,  in  the  spirit  of  its  founder,  the  commonwealth  originally  formed 
by  it,  but  could  lead  that  further,  and  supply  to  it  whatever  was 
lacking — this  force  took  to  itself  fresh  power,  at  the  right  time,  to 
become,  in  a  word,  the  redeemer  of  the  commimity.  .  .  By  Samuel  a 
new  and  peculiar  direction  was  given  to  the  whole  people,  which  we 
do  not  i*emark  either  under  Ehud  or  under  Deborah :  the  possibility  of 
a  final  victory  of  the  Jahve-Religion,  in  the  fight  as  well  with  the 
heathen  as  with  inner  corruption,  first  under  him  steps  clearly  forward ; 
and  what  in  the  next  centuries  unfolded  itself  ever  more  fully  we  see 
here  presented  in  its  germ.  .  .  A  new  power,  and  certainly  the  most 
spiritual  which  is  conceivable,  was  from  this  time  established  among 
the  people,  a  power  which  more  than  all  others  affected  the  following 
centuries,  and  brought  forth  all  the  greatness  which  in  them  was  pos- 
sible."—[Ewald  :  "  Geschichte  des  Volkes  Israel " ;  Gottingen  ed.,  1865 : 
Band  II. :  S.  598,  f. 

XXIII. :  p.  227. — '*  And  the  more  claim  an  idea  has  to  be  considered 
living,  the  more  various  will  be  its  aspects ;  and  the  more  social  and 
political  is  its  nature,  the  more  complicated  and  subtle  will  be  its  issues, 
and  the  longer  and  more  eventful  will  be  its  course.  And  in  the  num- 
ber of  these  special  ideas,  which,  from  their  very  depth  and  richness, 
cannot  be  fully  understood  at  once,  but  are  more  and  more  clearly  ex- 
pressed and  taught  the  longer  they  last,— having  aspects  many  and 
bearings  many,  mutually  connected  and  growing  one  out  of  another, 
and  all  parts  of  a  whole,  with  a  sympathy  and  correspondence  keep- 
ing pace  with  the  ever-changing  necessities  of  the  world,  multiform, 
prolific,  and  ever  resourceful, — among  these  great  doctrines  surely  we 
Christians  shall  not  refuse  a  foremost  place  to  Christianity.  Such, 
previously  to  the  determination  of  the  fact,  must  be  our  anticipation 
concerning  it  from  a  contemplation  of  its  initial  achievements." — [J. 
H.  Newman:  "Essay  on  Devel.  of  Christ.  Doctrine";  London  ed., 
1878:  p.  56. 

XXIV. :  p.  230. — "  In  the  first  place,  then,  his  great  design  was  to 
supply  those  steps  in  the  author's  demonstrations  which  were  not  dis- 
coverable without  much  study  and  research,  and  which  had  rendered 
tlie  original  work  so  abstruse  and  difficult  as  to  lead  a  writer  in  the 
Edinburgh  Review  to  say  that  there  were  not  twelve  individ'ials  in 


514  APPENDIX. 

Great  Britain  who  could  read  it  with  any  facility.  Dr.  Bowditch  hi  mseh 
was  accustomed  to  remark,  *  Whenever  I  meet  in  La  Place  with  th« 
words,  'Thus  it  plainly  appears,'  I  am  sure  that  hours,  and  perhaps 
days,  of  hard  study,  will  alone  enable  me  to  discover  how  it  plainly 
appears.'" — ["Memoir  of  N.  Bowditch,"  by  N.  Ingersoll  Bowditch  . 
Boston  ed.,  1840:  p.  62. 

"  Every  person  who  is  acquainted  with  the  original  must  be  aware 
of  the  great  number  of  steps  in  the  demonstrations  which  are  left  un 
supplied,  in  many  cases  comprehending  the  entire  processes  which 
connect  the  enunciation  of  the  propositions  with  the  conclusions ;  and 
the  constant  reference  which  is  made,  both  tacit  and  expressed,  to  re- 
sults and  principles,  both  analytical  and  mechanical,  which  are  coex- 
tensive with  the  entire  range  of  knoAvn  mathematical  science :  but  in 
Dr.  Bowditch's  very  elaborate  commentary  every  deficient  step  is  sup- 
plied, every  suppressed  demonstration  is  introduced,  every  reference 
explained  and  illustrated." — [Address  of  H.  R.  H.  the  Duke  of  Sussex: 
President  of  Royal  Society,  1838:  Appendix  to  Memoir  of  Dr.  Bow- 
ditch: p.  162. 

XXV. :  p.  231. — "And  so,  too,  Plato,  when  he  says,  *  The  blame  is 
his  who  chooses,  and  God  is  blameless,'  took  this  from  the  prophet 
Moses  and  uttered  it.  For  Moses  is  more  ancient  than  all  the  Greek 
Avriters.  And  whatever  both  philosophers  and  poets  have  said  con- 
cerning the  immortality  of  the  soul,  or  punishments  after  death,  or 
contemplation  of  things  heavenly,  or  doctrines  of  the  like  kind,  they 
have  received  such  suggestions  from  the  prophets  as  have  enabled 
them  to  understand  and  interpret  these  things.  .  .  Not  only  do  we 
fearlessly  read  them  [the  books  of  Hystaspes,  or  of  the  Sibyl,  or  of  the 
prophets],  but  as  you  see,  we  bring  them  for  your  inspection,  knowing 
that  their  contents  will  be  pleasing  to  all." — [Justin  Martyr  :  Apol. 
I. :  44. 

See  also  the  Second  Apology:  "  Those  of  the  Stoic  school,  so  far  as 
their  moral  teaching  went,  were  admirable,  as  were  also  the  poets  in 
some  particulars,  on  account  of  the  seed  of  reason  [the  Logos]  im- 
planted in  every  race  of  men.  .  .  I  confess  that  I  strive  with  all  my 
strength  to  be  found  a  Christian,  not  because  the  teachings  of  Plato 
are  different  from  those  of  Christ,  but  because  they  are  not  in  all  re- 
spects similar,  as  neither  are  those  of  the  others,  Stoics,  and  poets,  and 
historians.  For  each  man  spoke  well  in  proportion  to  the  share  he 
had  of  the  spermatic  word,  seeing  what  was  related  to  it.  .  .  What- 
ever things  were  rightly  said,  among  all  men,  are  the  property  of  us 
Christians." — [vm.,  xiii. 

In  Justin's  "Exhortation  to  the  Greeks,"  the  larger  part  [chaps,  xv.- 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIL  545 

xxxvii.]  is  occupied  with  the  testimonies  to  be  found  in  Greek  poet<i 
and  philosophers,  especially  in  Plato,  to  certain  Divine  truths. 

XXVI.:  p.  231. — ''Our  book  will  not  shrink  from  making  use  of 
what  is  best  in  philosophy,  and  other  preparatory  instruction.  .  .  Let 
a  man  milk  the  sheep's  milk  if  he  need  sustenance ;  let  him  shear  the 
wool  if  he  need  clothing.  And  in  this  way  let  me  produce  the  fruit  of 
Greek  erudition.  .  .  For,  like  farmers  who  irrigate  the  land  before- 
hand, so  we  also  water  with  the  liquid  stream  of  Greek  learning  what 
in  it  is  earthy :  so  that  it  may  receive  the  spiritual  seed  cast  into  it,  and 
may  be  capable  of  easily  nourishing  it.  The  Stromata  will  contain 
the  truth  mixed  up  in  the  dogmas  of  philosophy,  or  rather  covered 
over  and  hidden,  as  the  edible  part  of  the  nut  in  the  shell.  .  .  Philos- 
ophy does  not  ruin  life  by  being  the  originator  of  false  practices  and 
base  deeds,  although  some  have  calumniated  it,  though  it  be  the  clear 
image  of  truth,  a  divine  gift  to  the  Greeks ;  nor  does  it  drag  us  away 
from  the  faith,  as  if  we  were  bewitched  by  some  delusive  art,  but 
rather,  so  to  speak,  by  the  use  of  an  ampler  circuit,  obtains  a  com- 
mon exercise  demonstrative  of  the  faith.  .  .  Accordingly,  before 
the  advent  of  the  Lord,  philosophy  was  necessary  to  the  Greeks 
for  righteousness.  And  now  it  becomes  conducive  to  piety :  being  a 
kind  of  preparatory  training  to  those  who  attain  to  faith  through  de- 
monstration. God  is  the  cause  of  all  good  things ;  but  of  some  prima- 
rily, as  of  the  Old  and  the  New  Testament ;  and  of  others  by  conse- 
quence, as  of  philosophy.  Perchance,  too,  philosophy  was  given  to 
the  Greeks  directly  and  primarily,  till  the  Lord  should  call  the  Greeks. 
Philosophy,  therefore,  was  a  preparation,  paving  the  way  for  him  who 
IS  perfected  in  Christ.  .  .  But  all  [the  sects  of  barbarian  and  Hellenic 
philosophy],  in  my  opinion,  are  illuminated  by  the  dawn  of  Light 
[Jesus].  .  .  There  is  then  in.  philosophy,  though  stolen  as  the  fire  by 
Prometheus,  a  slender  spark,  capable  of  being  fanned  into  a  flame,  a 
trace  of  wisdom,  and  an  impulse  from  God." — [Clement,  of  Alexan- 
dria: "Stromata":  L  :  1,  2,  5, 13, 17. 

XXVII.:  p.  231.— "It  seems  to  me  also  that  that  fancy  of  Plato, 
that  those  stones  which  we  call  precious  stones  derive  their  lustre 
from  a  reflection,  as  it  were,  of  the  stones  in  that  better  land,  is  taken 
from  the  words  of  Isaiah  in  describing  the  city  of  God :  '  I  will  make 
thy  battlements  of  jasper,  thy  stones  shall  be  crystal,'  and  '  I  will  lay 
thy  foundations  with  sapphires.'  Those  who  hold  in  greatest  rever- 
ence the  teaching  of  Plato,  explain  this  myth  of  his  as  an  allegory. 
And  the  prophecies  from  which,  as  we  conjecture,  Plato  has  borrowed, 
will  be  explained  by  those  who,  leading  a  godly  life,  devote  their  time 
to  the  study  of  the  Scripture,  to  those  who  are  qualified  to  learn,  by 
35 


546  APPENDIX. 

purity  of  life,  and  desire  to  advance  in  divine  knowledge.  .  .  Such  ara 
the  sentiments  of  Plato  [on  the  wickedness  of  Injustice],  and  indeed 
they  were  held  by  divine  men  before  his  time." — [Origen,  adv.  Celsus: 
vn. :  30,  58. 

XXVIII. :  p.  231. — "  I  cannot  recount  at  present  all  the  addresses 
of  this  kind  which  he  [Origen]  delivered  to  us,  with  the  view  of  per- 
suading us  to  take  up  the  pursuit  of  philosophy.  .  .  For  he  asserted 
further  that  there  could  be  no  genuine  piety  towards  the  Lord  of  all, 
in  the  man  who  despised  this  gift  of  philosophy, — a  gift  which  man 
alone,  of  all  the  creatures  of  the  earth,  has  been  deemed  honorable  and 
worthy  enough  to  possess.  .  .  He  was  also  the  first  and  only  man  that 
urged  me  to  study  the  philosophy  of  the  Greeks,  and  persuaded  me  by 
his  own  moral  example  both  to  hear  and  to  hold  by  the  doctrine  of 
morals.  .  .  To  secure  us  against  falling  into  the  unhappy  experience 
of  most,  he  did  not  introduce  us  to  any  one  exclusive  school  of  philos- 
ophy ;  nor  did  he  judge  it  proper  for  us  to  go  away  with  any  single 
class  of  philosophical  opinions,  but  he  introduced  us  to  all,  and  deter- 
mined that  we  should  be  ignorant  of  no  kind  of  Grecian  doctrine 
Thus  did  he  deal  with  us,  selecting  and  setting  before  us  all  that  ^^as 
useful  and  true  in  all  the  various  philosophers,  and  putting  aside  all 
that  was  false." — [Gregory  Thaumat.:  "Panegyric  on  Origen":  vi., 
XI.,  XIV. 

XXIX. :  p.  231. — The  spirit  of  Basil's  discourse  to  the  young  on  the 
reading  of  Pagan  literature  is  sufBciently  indicated  by  a  few  elegant 
and  discreet  sentences : — 

"But  the  rather  may  we  approve  those  passages  in  wliich  they  [the 
heathen  ^mters]  have  commended  virtue,  or  censured  vice.  For  as 
some  enjoy  the  delightful  odor  or  color  of  flowers  alone,  while  the  bees 
know  how  to  extract  honey  from  them ;  so  here  also,  to  those  who  do 
not  merely  seek  the  pleasantness  and  sweetness  of  books  of  this  sort,  it 
is  permitted  to  gain  something  of  advantage  from  them  in  the  spirit. 
Wholly,  therefore,  after  the  fashion  of  the  bees,  is  use  to  be  made  by 
us  of  these  books.  For  the  bees  do  not  light  upon  all  flowers  alike, 
nor  indeed  to  some  do  they  fly  at  all,  but  seek  to  avoid  them  altogether ; 
and  when  they  have  once  collected  from  some  what  is  suitable  to  then' 
use,  they  pass  by  the  rest.  We  also,  if  we  are  wise,  when  anything 
suits  our  need,  and  is  in  harmony  with  the  truth,  shall  collect  it  out  of 
these  writings,  and  let  the  rest  pass.  And  just  as  in  plucking  flowers 
in  the  garden  we  avoid  the  thorns,  so  in  discourses  of  this  sort,  while 
taking  for  ouraelves  whatever  is  useful  we  may  shun  what  is  harmful." 
—[Opera:  Paris:  1722:  Tom.  II.:  p.  176. 

XXX. :  p.  232.-  -"Moreover,  if  those  who  are  called  philosophers,  and 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  547 

especially  the  Platonists,  have  said  aught  that  is  true  and  in  hawnony 
with  our  faith,  we  are  not  only  not  to  shrink  from  it,  but  to  claim 
it  for  our  own  use  from  those  who  have  unlawful  possession  of  it.  .  . 
All  branches  of  heathen  learning  have  not  only  false  and  superstitious 
fancies,  and  heavy  burdens  of  unnecessary  toil,  which  every  one  of  us, 
when  going  out  under  the  leadership  of  Christ  from  the  fellowship  of 
the  heathen,  ought  to  abhor  and  avoid ;  but  they  contain  also  liberal 
instruction  which  is  better  adapted  to  the  use  of  the  truth,  and  some 
most  excellent  precepts  of  morality ;  and  some  truths  in  regard  even  to 
the  worship  of  the  One  God  are  found  among  them.  Now  these  are,  so 
to  speak,  their  gold  and  silver,  which  they  did  not  create  themselves, 
but  dug  out  of  the  mines  of  God's  providence  which  are  everywhere 
scattered  abroad." — [Augustine:  "Christ.  Doct.";  II.:  40. 

"Illustrious,  therefore,  both  in  his  life  and  in  his  death,  Socrates 
left  very  many  disciples  of  his  philosophy,  who  vied  with  one  another 
in  desire  for  proficiency  in  handling  those  moral  questions  which  con- 
cern the  chief  good,  the  possession  of  which  can  make  a  man  blessed. 
.  .  But  among  the  disciples  of  Socrates,  Plato  was  the  one  who  shone 
with  a  glory  which  far  excelled  that  of  the  others,  and  who  not  un- 
justly surpassed  them  all.  .  .  To  Plato  is  given  the  praise  of  having  per- 
fected philosophy  by  combining  both  parts  [the  active  and  the  contem- 
plative] into  one.  .  .  The  true  and  highest  good,  according  to  Plato,  is 
God;  and  therefore  he  would  call  him  a  philosopher  who  loves  God; 
for  philosophy  is  directed  to  the  obtaining  of  the  blessed  life,  and  he 
who  loves  God  is  blessed  in  the  enjoyment  of  God." — [Augustine: 
"Civ.  Dei";  VIII. :  3,4,  8. 

Lactantius  wished  that  Cicero,  that  '  man  of  consummate  eloquence,' 
that  'greatest  author  in  the  Roman  language,'  might  rise  from  the 
dead,  if  it  were  possible,  that  he  might  learn  and  teach  that  better  wis- 
dom which  he  seemed  to  have  been  reaching  after  in  his  treatise  De 
OflBciis.— [Div.  Inst. ;  III. :  13. 

XXXI. :  p.  232. — "  I  am  sorry,  from  my  heart,  that  Plato  has  been 
the  caterer  to  all  these  heretics.  For  in  the  Phaedo  he  imagines  that 
souls  wander  from  this  world  to  that,  and  thence  back  again  hither, 
etc.  .  .  Just  as  Seneca  says,  whom  we  so  often  find  on  our  side,  [saepe 
noster] :  '  There  are  implanted  within  us  the  seeds  of  all  the  arts  and 
periods  of  life ;  and  God,  our  master,  secretly  produces  our  mental  dis- 
positions ' ;  that  is  from  the  germs  which  are  implanted  and  hidden  in 
us  by  means  of  infancy." — [TertuUian:  "  De  Anima  ";  xxiil. :  xx. 

The  supposed  relations  between  St.  Paul  and  Seneca  are  treated  at 
large  by  Fleury,  "Saint  Paul  et  Seneque"  [Paris,  1853]:  but  a  brief 
statement  concerning  them,  made  by  Troplong,  covers  all  that  can  be 
reasonably  said  on  the  subject.     He  believes  the  alleged  correspond- 


548  APPENDIX. 

ence  between  the  great  Stoical  philosopher  and  the  great  apostle  to  be 
apoeiyphal ;  but  he  dwells  upon  the  facts  that  the  Gospel  had  already 
been  preached  at  Rome,  and  had  gained  converts,  before  Paul  reached 
the  city  ;  that  during  his  own  residence  there  his  word  met  many 
with  convei'ting  power,  some  even  of  the  imperial  household;  that 
Gallio,  before  whom  Paul  had  been  brought  at  Corinth,  was  the 
brother  of  Senetfa,  with  whom  he  was  most  intimate,  of  whom  he 
speaks  with  constant  affection  and  admiration,  and  to  whom  some  of 
his  essays  were  dedicated ;  that  it  is  quite  impossible  that  Seneca,  whose 
mind  was  drawn  as  by  a  natural  hung-er  to  great  philosophical  and  so- 
cial questions,  should  have  failed  to  know  something  of  the  new  sys- 
tem which  was  lifting  its  serene  front  against  calumny  and  persecu- 
tion, in  the  capital,  by  his  side ;  and  that  his  philosophical  thought,  hia 
ethics,  his  very  style,  have  upon  them  a  character  before  unknown 
among  heathen  writers,  in  which  seems  a  reflection  of  the  peculiar 
Christian  ideas.  His  conclusion  is  that  Christianity  at  least  enveloped 
Seneca  with  its  new  atmosphere,  and  that  it  modified  and  purified, 
perhaps  in  spite  of  himself,  his  spirit  and  his  language. — ["De  I'lnflu- 
ence  du  Christianisme  " ;  Paris  ed.,  1868:  pp.  72-79. 

XXXII.:  p.  232. — **A  speculative  treatment  of  Christian  doctrine 
was  indispensable,  if  Christianity  should  be  accessible  to  the  philosophi- 
cal culture  of  the  times.  It  could  only  proceed  from  Platonism,  which 
of  all  philosophical  systems  stood  nearest  to  Christianity.  While 
many  Platonic  philosophei'S  were  brought  over  to  Christianity  by  this 
internal  relation,  they  received  the  latter  as  the  most  perfect  philoso- 
phy, and  retained,  with  their  philosophical  mantle,  their  philosophical 
turn  of  mind  also.  .  .  They  overvalued,  even,  the  actual  agreement  of 
Plato  with  Christianity,  and  believed  that  they  found  many  a  Platonic 
idea  in  the  latter,  which  in  reality  they  themselves  had  fii^t  introduced 
into  it."— [Gieseler:  "Eccl.  History";  Edinburgh  ed.,  1854:  Vol.  1: 
pp.  162-3. 

XXXIII. :  p.  233. — The  early  Christian  regard  for  good  learning  ap- 
pears as  strikingly  illustrated  as  anywhere  else  in  a  remark  of  Lactan- 
tius,  in  his  essay  ' '  De  Mortibus  Persecutorum  "  —  if  it  be  accepted  as  his. 
After  recording  the  mfamous  cruelties  of  Galerius,  who  was  'wont 
not  to  inflict  the  slighter  sorts  of  punishment,  as  to  banish,  to  im- 
prison, or  to  send  criminals  to  work  in  the  mines,  but  to  bum,  to  cra- 
eify,  to  expose  to  wild  beasts — things  done  daily,  and  without  hesita- 
tion,' he  adds:  "But  these  were  slight  evils  in  the  government  oi 
Galerius,  when  compared  with  what  follows.  For  eloquence  was 
extinguished,  pleaders  cut  off,  and  the  learned  in  the  laws  either  exiled 
OP  slain.    Useful  letters  came  to  be  viewed  in  the  same  light  as  magical 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  549 

and  forbidden  arts ;  and  all  who  possessed  them  were  trampled  upon 
and  execrated,  as  if  they  had  been  hostile  to  government  and  publia 
enemies. " — [xxii. 

"Many  other  crimes  were  perpetrated  at  this  time  by  the  u-religioua 
against  the  pious,  at  sea  and  on  land ;  for  the  ungodly  emperor  [ Juhan] 
had  enacted  laws  against  religion.  The  first  of  these  laws  prohibited 
the  children  of  Galileans — for  this  was  the  name  he  gave  to  Christiana 
— from  being  instructed  in  poetry,  rhetoric,  or  philosophy.  '  For  we,' 
said  he,  'according  to  the  old  proverb,  are  smitten  from  our  own 
wings;  our  authors  furnish  weapons  to  carry  on  war  against  us.'" — 
[Theodoret:  Eccles.  Hist.:  III.:  8. 

Ammianus,  himself  in  religious  sympathy  with  Julian,  comments 
sharply  on  this  action :  "  His  forbidding  masters  of  rhetoric  and  gram- 
mar to  instruct  Christians  was  a  cruel  action,  and  one  deserving  to  be 
buried  in  everlasting  oblivion.  .  .  Among  the  exceptions  [to  his  un- 
objectionable laws]  was  that  cruel  one  which  forbade  Christian  masters 
of  rhetoric  and  grammar  to  teach,  unless  they  came  over  to  the  heathen 
gods."— [XXII. :  10;  xxv. :  4. 

XXXIV. :  p.  332. — ' '  During  the  short  rule  of  abbot  Desiderius  at  Monte 
Cassino,  his  monks  wrote  out  St.  Austin's  fifty  Homilies,  his  Lettei-s, 
liis  Comment  upon  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  upon  St.  Paul,  and  upon 
Oenesis ;  parts  of  St.  Jerome  and  St.  Ambrose,  part  of  St.  Bede,  St. ' 
Leo's  Sermons,  the  Orations  of  St.  Gregory  Nazianzen ;  the  Acts  of  the 
Apostles,  the  Epistles,  and  the  Apocalypse ;  various  histories,  including 
that  of  St.  Gregory  of  Tours,  and  of  Josephus  on  the  Jewish  war,  Jus- 
tinian's Institutes,  and  many  ascetic  and  other  works ;  of  the  Classics, 
Cicero's  de  Natura  Deonmi,  Terence,  Ovid's  Fasti,  Horace,  and  Virgil. 
Maurus  Lapi,  in  the  fifteenth  century,  copied  a  thousand  volumes  in 
less  than  fifty  years.  Jerome,  a  monk  in  an  Austrian  monastery,  wrote 
so  great  a  number  of  books  that,  it  is  said,  a  wagon  with  six  horses 
would  scarcely  suifice  to  draw  them.  .  .  Alcuin,  in  his  letters  to  his 
friends,  quotes  Virgil  again  and  again ;  he  also  quotes  Horace,  Terence, 
Pliny,  besides  frequent  allusions  to  the  heathen  philosophers.  Lupus 
quotes  Horace,  Cicero,  Suetonius,  Virgil,  and  Martial.  Gerbert 
quotes  Virgil,  Cicero,  Horace,  Terence,  and  Sallust.  Petrus  Cellensis 
quotes  Horace,  Seneca,  and  Terence.  Hildebert  quotes  Vu'gil  and 
Cicero,  and  refers  to  Diogenes,  Epictetus,  Croesus,  Themistocles,  and 
other  personages  of  ancient  history.  Paschasius  Radbert's  favorite  au- 
thors were  Cicero  and  Terence.  Abbo  of  Fleury  was  especially  famil- 
iar witli  Terence,  Sallust,  Virgil,  and  Horace.  Peter  the  Venerable, 
with  Virgil  and  Horace ;  Hepidann  of  St.  Gall  took  Sallust  as  a  mode] 
of  style."— [J.  H.  Newman  :  "  Historical  Sketches  " ;  Ijondon  ed.,  1873: 
Vol.  2  :  pp.  413,  465. 


550  APPENDIX. 

XXXY. :  p.  232. — "It  was  while  occupied  in  his  missionary  labor* 
that  he  [Anschar]  is  said  to  have  composed  the  series  of  Scriptural  de- 
signs, briefly  explained  by  passages  from  the  Holy  Scriptures,  which 
afterwards  became  known  as  the  Bible  of  the  Poor, — '  Biblia  Pauper- 
um.'  .  .  That  it  was  in  great  demand  is  proved  by  the  number  of  MSS. 
still  in  existence ;  and  that  books  of  its  class  were  greatly  required  may 
be  easily  understood,  when  it  is  stated  that  a  complete  copy  of  the  Bible 
at  that  period  frequently  cost  a  thousand  florins. .  .  The  period  of  its  execu- 
tion [from  an  engraved  block]  may  probably  be  estimated  as  lying  be- 
tween 1410  and  1420 ;  possibly  earlier,  but  certainly  not  later.  .  .  The 
next  example  I  shall  give  from  the  Block-books  is  a  page  from  the  '  Book 
of  Canticles, '  as  it  is  commonly  called ;  but  more  fully  entitled,  '  Historia 
seu  Providentia  Virginis  Mariae  ex  Cantico  Canticorum.'  This  book 
consists  of  a  number  of  texts  selected  from  the  '  Song  of  Solomon,'  aa 
supposed  to  typify  the  history  of  the  Virgin  Mary.  .  .  The  third 
Block-book  I  shall  allude  to  is  the  'Apocalypse.'  Some  have  consid- 
ered this  work  earlier  than  the  Biblia  Pauperum.  .  .  My  next  speci- 
men is  from  the  'Ars  Memorandi,'  a  work  intended  to  recall,  by  means 
of  familiar  signs,  the  leading  passages  of  the  four  Gospels." — [H.  Noel 
Humphreys  :  "Hist,  of  the  Art  of  Printing";  London  ed.,  1867  :  pp. 
38-42. 

"The  rubies  of  the  first  issue  of  Gutenberg's  Bible  [about  A.D.  1455], 
as  just  stated,  were  left  blank,  to  be  written  in  by  hand,  and  spaces 
were  also  left  for  the  illuminator  to  introduce  the  capitals;  so  that  the 
book  had,  when  completed  by  hand,  much  the  effect  of  an  illuminated 
MS.  of  the  period ;  but  the  text  was  less  free,  and  even  less  distinct, 
and  there  was  some  awkwardness  in  the  ends  of  the  lines  where  blanks 
occur,  when  a  woi'd  could  not  be  got  in ;  but,  on  the  whole,  it  is  per- 
haps the  noblest  coup  (Tessai,  in  a  new  and  intricate  art,  that  ever  was 
produced." — [p.  78. 

XXXVI. :  p.  233. — De  Rossi  speaks  of  "the  universality  of  the  pic- 
tures in  the  subterranean  cemeteries,  and  the  richness,  the  variety,  the 
freedom  of  the  more  ancient  types,  when  contrasted  with  the  cycle  of 
pictures  which  I  see  clearly  becoming  more  restricted  and  impover- 
ished toward  the  end  of  the  third  century."  He  "does  not  hesitate  to 
name  the  first  century,  or  the  very  beginning  of  the  second,  as  the  true 
date  of  some  paintings  in  the  crypts  of  Lucina,  in  the  cemetery  of 
Domitilla,  and  of  others  elsewhere ;  and  others  again  he  attributes  to 
the  middle  and  end  of  the  second  century,  or  beginning  of  the  third. 
.  .  The  Good  Shepherd  was  undoubtedly  one  of  the  earliest  and  most 
frequent  subjects  of  representation  among  the  early  Christians.  It  is  the 
very  type  and  sample  of  the  peaceful  character  of  Christian  art  during  its 
first  period ;  and  it  is  to  be  seen  on  every  species  of  Christian  monument 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  551 

that  lias  come  down  io  us.  .  .  It  is  probably  represented  twice  aa 
often  as  any  other  subject ;  after  this,  Moses  striking  the  rock,  Daniel, 
Jonas,  and  Lazarus  are  repeated  with  great  frequency ;  then,  but  at  a 
considerable  distance,  Noah,  Abraham,  the  Three  Children,  and  the 
paralytic." — ["Eoma  Sotterranea":  (Northcote,  and  Brownlow),  Lon- 
don ed.,  1879  :  Part  II. :  pp.  9,  23,  44. 

"  Christianity,  still  in  its  youth,  could  only  approach  with  fear  and 
trembling  that  voluptuous  expi-ession  of  a  sensuous  life  which  was  a 
characteristic  of  ancient  sculpture,  down  to  its  latest  periods.  Tlie 
danger  of  apostasy  to  the  old  varied  forms  of  idolatry  was  too  serious. 
Hence  it  was  that  the  Christians  only  occasionally  dared  to  make  use 
of  the  plastic  art,  to  express  the  new  ideas  in  the  most  timid  manner; 
though,  in  making  such  use,  they  willingly  conformed  to  the  laws  of 
antique  art.  .  .  But  the  Christian  idea  was  to  find  a  more  vigorous 
and  general  expression  in  the  realm  of  painting ;  for  in  this  connection 
there  was  less  danger  of  an  intermixture  of  ancient  Pagan  modes  of 
presentation.  Young  Christian  art  availed  itself  more  and  more  of 
this  means,  and  conquered  for  itseK  a  new  field  of  activity,  with  artis- 
tic laws  and  technicalities  of  its  own.  .  .  But  before  this  consiunma- 
tion  could  be  attained,  a  long  series  of  stages  had  to  be  traversed,  lead- 
ing from  an  utter  tastelessness  in  art  up  to  the  rainbow-hued  glory  of 
'the  superb  basilicas." — [Liibke  :  "History  of  Art";  New  York  ed., 
1878  :  Vol.  1  :  pp.  372-4. 

"As  to  Christianity  setting  itself  against  art,  the  Christians  made  all 
the  use  they  could  of  the  art- work  of  heathen  and  Christian  hands 
alike,  in  the  catacombs.  Every  symbol  and  myth  and  decoration 
which  was  not  absolutely  contrary  to  and  directed  against  the  faith, 
Christians  cheerfully  accepted.  .  .  Up  to  the  sack  by  Alaric,  Rome  is 
the  seat  of  Graeco-Christian  art,  which  degenerates  and  barbarizes  with 
aU  other  art,  until,  with  Alaric's  taking  of  Rome,  '  at  one  stride  comes 
the  dark,'  and  the  art  of  the  catacombs  ceases." — [St.  John  Tyrwhitt  : 
"Christian  Art";  London  ed.,  1872  :  pp.  59,  Q2. 

"  Christian  art  [in  the  catacombs]  is  obviously  a  new  thing,  at  least 
in  the  thoughts  which  it  embodies,  though  it  makes  use  of  the  methods 
which  have  been  handed  down  to  it  by  ancient  art,  and  is  itself  devel- 
oped slowly,  as  lacking  the  stimulus  of  success.  .  .  The  highest  type 
of  beauty  is  not  now  the  subtle  grace,  the  Olympian  calm  of  the 
Greek,  nor  the  proud  dignity  of  the  old  Roman ;  it  is  the  deep  feeling 
of  the  soul,  eloquent  of  hope  and  love.  The  glowing  aureole  which, 
in  Christian  art,  encircles  the  head,  is  woven  of  faith  and  charity. 
The  world  within  and  the  world  above  have  set  their  impress  on  these 
faces,  which  were  cast  originally  in  the  same  mould  as  those  of  the 
statues  in  the  Capitol.  As  we  gaze  on  the  Virgin  in  the  catacomb  of 
Priscilla,  we  feel  that  the  art  which  by  the  hand  of  Raphael  will  fij 


552  APPEKVIX. 

upon  the  canvas  tlie  purest  ideal  of  Christian  beauty,  is  ah*eady  bora 
among  those  proscribed  Christians  who,  in  the  brief  interval  of  rest 
from  persecution,  hurriedly  trace  these  noble  outlines  in  memory  of 
the  confessors." — [Pressense  :  "  Early  Years  of  Christianity  " ;  London 
od.,  1880  :  Vol.  4  :  pp.  513-14. 

XXXVII.:  p.  233.— "He  [the  traveller  at  Ravenna]  will  see  the 
tombs  of  Western  Emperors  and  Gothic  Kings:  he  will  look  upon  th« 
first  efforts  of  Cliristian  art,  after  it  emerged  from  the  seclusion  of  the 
Catacombs :  .  .  above  all,  he  will  gaze  in  wonder  upon  those  marvel- 
lous mosaics  which  line  the  walls  of  the  churches — pictures  which 
were  as  old  in  the  time  of  Giotto  as  Giotto's  frescoes  are  now,  yet 
which  retain  (thanks  to  the  furnace  tlu'ough  which  the  artist  passed 
his  materials)  colours  as  bright  and  gilding  as  gorgeous  as  when  they 
were  first  placed  on  those  walls  in  the  days  of  Placidia  or  of  Justinian. 
.  .  Always,  whether  the  work  be  well  or  ill  executed,  dimly  majestic 
or  uncouth  and  ludicrous,  we  have  the  satisfaction  of  feeling  that  we 
are  looking  upon  a  picture  which  is  substantially,  both  in  colour  and 
form,  such  as  it  was  when  it  left  the  hand  of  the  artist,  perhaps  four- 
teen centuries  ago." — [Hodgkin  :  "Italy  and  her  Invaders";  Oxford 
ed.,  1880:  Vol.  1:  pp.  436-8. 

Compare  the  graceful  rendering  by  the  same  author  of  lines  of  Side-" 
nius,  descriptive  of  the  Basilica  raised  at  Lyons,  in  the  fifth  century, 
by  Bishop  Patiens : — 

"  Inly  gleams  there  a  light :  the  golden  ceiling 

"  Glows  so  fair  that  the  sunbeams  love  to  wander 

"  Slowly  over  the  sun-like  burnished  metal. 

"  Marbles  varied  in  hue,  with  slabs  resplendent, 

*'  Line  the  vault  and  the  floor,  and  frame  the  windows; 

*'  And,  in  glass  on  the  walls,  the  green  of  springtide 

"  Bounds  the  blue  of  the  lake  with  winding  margent." 

["  Italy,  etc.":  Vol.  2:  p.  824. 

XXXVIII. :  p.  233.—"  Even  in  the  first  half  of  the  thirteenth  cen- 
tury,  one  of  the  many  strictly-balanced  forms  of  metre,  in  which  Eu- 
rope was  then  so  fruitful,  became  a  normal  and  recognized  form  in 
Italy — the  sonnet.  .  .  The  clearness  and  beauty  of  its  structure,  the 
invitation  it  gave  to  elevate  the  thought,  in  the  second  and  more  rap- 
idly moving  half,  and  the  ease  with  which  it  could  be  learned  by 
heart,  made  it  valued  even  by  the  greatest  masters.  .  .  In  Italy  w« 
can  trace  an  undoubted  progress  from  the  time  when  the  sonnet  came 
into  existence.  In  the  second  half  of  the  thirteenth  century  the  *  Tro- 
vatori  della  transid^one,'  as  they  have  been  recently  named,  mark  the 
passage  from  the  Troubadours  to  the  poets — that  is,  to  those  who  wrote 
under  the  influence  of  antiquity.    The  simplicity  and  strength  of  theii- 


NOT£JS  TO  LECTURE  VII.  ^53 

feeliug,  the  vigorous  delineation  of  fact,  the  precise  expression  and 
rounding  off  of  their  sonnets  and  other  poems,  herald  the  coming  of  a 
Dante.  .  .  Its  plan  [of  the  Divina  Commedia]  and  the  ideas  on  which 
it  is  based,  belong  to  the  Middle  Ages,  and  appeal  to  our  interest  onl;^ 
liistorically ;  but  it  is  nevertheless  the  beginning  of  all  modern  poetry, 
through  the  power  and  richness  shown  in  the  description  of  human 
nature  in  every  shape  and  attitude.  .  .  More  than  a  century  elapsed 
before  the  spiritual  element  in  paintmg  and  sculpture  attained  a  power 
of  expression  in  any  way  analogous  to  the  Divine  Comedy." — [Burck- 
hardt:  " Renaissance  in  Italy " ;  London  ed. ,  1878 :  Vol.11.:  pp.  39—13. 
"  It  is  to  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries  that  we  are  accustomed 
to  assign  that  new  birth  of  the  human  spirit — if  it  ought  not  rather  to 
be  called  a  renewal  of  its  strength  and  quickening  of  its  sluggish  life — 
with  which  the  modem  time  begins.  And  the  date  is  weU -chosen;  for 
it  was  then  first  that  the  transcendently  powerful  influence  of  Greek 
literature  began  to  work  upon  the  world.  But  it  must  not  be  forgotten 
that  for  a  long  time  previous  there  had  been  in  progress  a  great  revival 
of  leaiTiing,  and  still  more  of  zeal  for  learning,  which,  being  caused  by 
and  directed  towards  the  literature  and  institutions  of  Rome,  might 
fitly  be  called  the  Roman  Renaissance.  .  .  In  the  fourteenth  century 
there  arose  in  Italy  the  first  great  masters  of  painting  and  song :  and 
the  literatui'e  of  the  new  languages,  si^ringing  into  the  fulness  of  life 
in  the  Divina  Commedia,  assumed  at  once  its  place  as  a  great  and  ever- 
growing power  in  the  affaii^  of  men." — [Bryce:  "  Holy  Roman  Em- 
ph-e";  London  ed.,  1876:  p.  241. 

XXXIX. :  p.  234. — "Paradise  Lost,  therefore,  is  not  the  less  the  first 
epic  poem  after  that  of  Homer  because  it  offers  few  pictures :  even  as 
the  history  of  our  Lord's  Passion  is  not  a  poem  because  one  can  scarcely 
touch,  even  with  the  point  of  a  needle,  a  passage  in  it  which  has  not 
furnished  material  for  a  multitude  of  the  greatest  artists.  The  Evan- 
gelists narrate  the  facts  with  all  possible  dryness  and  simplicity,  and 
the  artist  avails  himself  of  the  different  portions  of  their  narrative, 
though  they  on  their  part  have  not  manifested  the  slightest  spark  of 
pictorial  geuius." — [Lessing  :  Laocoon  (Sir  R.  Phillimore's  trans.)  ; 
London  ed.,  1874:  p.  142. 

XL. :  p.  234, — The  marvellously  rich  description  by  Ruskin  of  the 
architecture  of  St.  Mark's  only  sets  forth,  as  in  a  golden  frame,  its  re- 
ligious significance : — "Round  the  walls  of  the  porches  there  are  set  pil- 
lars of  variegated  stones,  jasper  and  porphyry,  and  deep-green  serpen- 
tine spotted  with  flakes  of  snow,  and  marbles,  that  half  refuse  and  half 
yield  to  the  sunshine,  Cleopatra-like,  '  their  bluest  veins  to  kiss ' — tha 
shadow,  as  it  steals  back  from  them,  revealing  line  after  line  of  azure 
undulation,  as  a  receding  tide  leaves  the  waved  sand;  their  capitals 


554  APPENDIX. 

Yield  with  interwoven  tracery,  rooted  knots  of  herbage,  and  di  if  ting 
leaves  of  acanthus  and  vine,  and  mystical  signs,  all  beginning  and 
ending  in  the  Cross ;  and  above  them,  in  the  broad  archivolts,  a  con 
tinuous  chain  of  language  and  of  life — angels,  and  the  signs  of  heaven, 
and  the  labours  of  men,  each  in  its  appointed  season  upon  the  earth; 
and  above  these,  another  range  of  glittering  pinnacles,  mixed  with 
white  arches  edged  mth  scarlet  flowers, — a  confusion  of  deliglit, 
amidst  which  the  breasts  of  the  Greek  horses  are  seen  blazing  in  their 
breadth  of  golden  strength,  and  the  St.  Mark's  Lion,  lifted  on  a  blue 
field  covered  with  stars,  until  at  last,  as  if  in  ecstasy,  the  crests  of  the 
arches  break  into  a  marble  foam,  and  toss  themselves  far  into  the  blue 
sky  in  flashes  and  wreaths  of  sculptured  spray,  as  if  the  breakers  on 
the  Lido  shore  had  been  frost-bound  before  they  fell,  and  the  sea- 
nymphs  had  inlaid  them  with  coral  and  amethyst.  .  .  .  The  whole 
edifice  is  to  be  regarded  less  as  a  temple  wherein  to  pray,  than  as  itself 
a  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  a  vast  illuminated  missal,  bound  with  ala- 
baster instead  of  parchment,  studded  with  porphyry  pillars  instead  of 
jewels,  and  written  within  and  without  in  letters  of  enamel  and  gold. 
.  .  .  And  the  man  must  be  little  capable  of  receiving  a  religious  im- 
pression of  any  kind,  who,  to  this  day,  does  not  acknowledge  some 
feeling  of  awe,  as  he  looks  up  to  the  pale  countenances  and  ghostly 
forms  which  haunt  the  dark  roofs  of  the  Baptisteries  of  Parma  and 
Florence,  or  remains  altogether  untouched  by  the  majesty  of  the  colos- 
sal images  of  apostles,  and  of  Him  who  sent  apostles,  that  look  down 
from  the  darkening  gold  of  the  domes  of  Venice  and  Pisa." — [Euskin: 
"  Stones  of  Venice  " ;  London  ed.,  1853:  Vol.  IL:  pp.  66,  92,  110. 

XLI. :  p.  235. — '*In  his  considerations  on  the  poetry  of  the  senti- 
ments, Schiller  thus  expresses  himself: — '  If  we  bear  in  mind  the  beau- 
tiful scenery  with  which  the  Greeks  were  suiTOunded,  and  remember 
the  opportunities  possessed  by  a  people  living  in  so  genial  a  climate,  of 
entering  into  the  free  enjoyment  of  the  contemplation  of  nature,  and 
observe  how  conformable  were  their  mode  of  thought,  the  bent  of  their 
imaginations,  and  the  habits  of  their  lives  to  the  simplicity  of  nature, 
we  cannot  fail  to  remark  with  surprise  how  few  traces  are  to  be  met 
amongst  them  of  the  sentimental  interest  with  which  we,  in  modem 
times,  attach  ourselves  to  the  individual  characteristics  of  natural 
scenery.  The  Greek  poet  is  certainly,  in  the  highest  degree,  correct,, 
faithful,  and  circumstantial,  in  his  descriptions  of  nature,  but  his  heart 
has  no  more  share  in  his  words  than  if  he  were  treating  of  a  garment, 
a  shield,  or  a  suit  of  armor.'  .  .  The  description  of  nature,  in  its  mani- 
fold richness  of  form,  as  a  distinct  branch  of  poetic  literature,  was 
wholly  unknown  to  the  Greeks.  The  landscape  appeal's  among  them 
merely  as  the  background  of  the  picture,  of  which  human  figurea 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  655 

constitute  the  main  subject.  .  .  That  which  we  miss  in  the  works  of 
the  Greeks,  I  will  not  say  from  their  want  of  susceptibility  to  the  beau- 
ties of  nature,  but  from  the  direction  assumed  by  their  literature,  is 
still  more  rarely  to  be  met  with  among  the  Romans.  .  .  No  descrip- 
tion has  been  transmitted  to  us  from  antiquity  of  the  eternal  snow  of 
the  Alps,  reddened  by  the  evening  glow  or  the  morning  dawn,  of  the 
beauty  of  the  blue  ice  of  the  glaciers,  or  of  the  sublimity  of  the  Swiss 
natural  scenery,  though  statesmen  and  generals,  with  men  of  letters 
in  their  retinue,  continually  passed  through  Helvetia  on  their  road  to 
Gaul.  .  .  At  the  period  when  the  feelings  died  away,  which  had  ani- 
mated classical  antiquity,  a  new  spirit  arose;  Christianity  gradually 
diffused  itseK,  and  wherever  it  was  adopted  as  the  religion  of  the  state 
it  not  only  exercised  a  beneficial  influence  on  the  condition  of  the 
lower  classes,  by  inculcating  the  social  freedom  of  mankind,  but  also 
expanded  the  views  of  men  in  their  communion  with  nature.  .  .  It 
was  the  tendency  of  the  Christian  mind  to  prove  from  the  order  of  the 
universe,  and  the  beauty  of  nature,  the  greatness  and  goodness  of  the 
Creator.  This  tendency  to  glorify  the  Deity  in  his  works  gave  rise  to 
a  taste  for  natiu-al  description.  .  .  In  this  simple  description  pby  Basil] 
of  scenery,  and  of  forest  life,  feelings  are  expressed  which  are  more  in- 
timately in  unison  with  those  of  modern  times  than  anything  that  has 
been  transmitted  to  us  from  Greek  or  Roman  antiquity." — [Humboldt: 
*' Cosmos";  London  ed.,  1870:  Vol.  II.:  pp.  372-73,  382,  391-94. 

XLII. :  p.  235. — "By  relieving  the  mind  from  the  distractions  and 
miportunities  of  the  unruly  passions,  she  [Christianity]  improves 
the  quality  of  the  understanding ;  while  at  the  same  time  she  presents 
for  its  contemplation  objects  so  great  and  so  bright  as  cannot  but  en- 
large the  organ  by  which  they  are  contemplated.  The  fears,  the  hopes, 
the  remembrances,  the  anticipations,  the  inward  and  outward  experi- 
ence, the  belief  and  the  faith,  of  the  Christian,  form  of  themselves  a 
philosophy,  and  a  sum  of  knowledge,  which  a  life  spent  in  the  Grove 
of  Academus,  or  the  painted  Porch,  could  not  have  attained  or  collected. 
The  result  is  contained  in  the  fact  of  a  wide  and  still  widening  Chris- 
tendom."—[Coleridge:  Works;  New  York  ed.,  1853:  Vol.  1:  p.  225. 

XIJII.:  p.  236.— "The  birth  of  Christianity  changed  the  whole 
firmament  of  thought.  It  was  a  new  spiritual  world  into  which  the 
race  was  transported.  Centuries  of  profound  brooding  were  required 
ere  mankmd  could  shake  off  the  torpor  of  the  ancient  darkness,  and 
awake  to  the  morning  light  of  the  Gospel.  But  when  at  last  the  eyes 
were  fully  opened,  the  natural  world  was  revealed  in  a  new  light, 
learning  revived  in  grander  aspects,  and  science  was  transformed  from 
speciality  to  generality. " —[Prof .  Benjamin  Pierce:  "Ideality  in  the 
Physical  Sciences";  Boston  ed.,  1881:  pp.  190-91. 


556  APPENDIJ. 

As  has  been  said  of  Shakespeare:  "  Shakespeare  may  not  have  been 
a  religious  man ;  he  may  or  may  not  have  been  a  Catholic,  or  a  Prot- 
estant ;  but  whatever  his  personal  A^ews  and  f eehngs  may  have  been, 
the  light  by  which  he  viewed  life  was  the  light  of  Chi'istianity.  Th« 
shine,  the  shadow,  and  the  color  of  the  moral  world  he  looked  upon 
were  all  caused  or  cast  by  the  Christian's  Sun  of  Eighteousness." — 
[Quoted  by  Principal  Shairp :  Princeton  Review ;    1880 :  p.  295. 

XLIV. :  p.  336. — "  This  remarkable  man  [Edwards]  the  metaphysi- 
cian of  America,  was  formed  among  the  Calvinists  of  New  England, 
when  their  stem  doctrine  i^tained  its  rigorous  authority.  His  power 
of  subtile  argument,  perhaps  unmatched,  certainly  unsurpassed,  among 
men,  was  jomed,  as  in  some  of  the  ancient  Mystics,  with  a  character 
which  raised  his  piety  to  fervour." — [Sir  James  Mackintosh:  "Misc. 
Works";  London  ed.,  1846:  Vol.  1:  p.  108. 

"  The  works  of  Jonathan  Edwards  were  among  his  [Robert  Hall's] 
favorites ;  and  it  is  an  ascertained  fact  that  before  he  was  nine  years 
of  age  he  had  perused  and  re-perused,  with  intense  interest,  the  treatises 
of  that  profound  and  extraordinary  thinker,  on  the  Affections,  and  on 
the  Will.  .  .  His  predilection,  next  to  the  Scriptures,  was  for  works  of 
clear,  strong,  and  conclusive  reasoning,  though  conveyed  in  language 
far  from  elevated,  and  sometimes  perhaps  obscure.  Thus  he,  for  full 
sixty  years,  read  Edwards's  writings  with  undiminished  pleasure." — 
["Memoir  of  Robert  Hall":  Works;  London  ed.,  1832:  Vol.  vi. :  pp. 
3,  99. 

Dugald  Stewart  spoke  of  Edwards  as  "  a  very  acute  and  honest  rea- 
soner,"  "the  most  celebrated,  and  indisputably  the  ablest,  champion 
of  the  scheme  of  necessity  who  has  since  appeared  "  [since  Collins]. — 
[Works;  Cambridge  ed.,  1829:  Vol.  6:  pp.  281-2. 

XLV. :  p.  236. — "  The  custom  of  preaching,  which  seems  to  consti- 
tute a  considerable  part  of  Christian  devotion,  had  not  been  introduced 
into  the  temples  of  antiquity;  and  t'le  ears  of  monarchs  were  never  in- 
vaded by  the  harsh  sound  of  popular  eloquence,  till  the  pulpits  of  the 
empire  were  filled  with  sacred  orators,  who  possessed  some  advantages 
unknown  to  their  profane  predecessors.  .  .  The  corruption  of  taste  and 
language  is  sti*ongly  marked  in  the  vehement  declamations  of  the  Latin 
bishops ;  but  the  compositions  of  Gregory  and  Chrysostom  have  been 
compared  with  the  most  splendid  models  of  Attic,  or  at  least  of  Asiatic, 
eloquence."— [Gibbon:  "The  Decline  and  Fall";  London  ed.,  1848: 
Vol.  2:  pp.  485-6. 

"Religious  eloquence  is  as  unquestionably  the  offspring  of  Chris- 
tianity as  popular  eloquence  is  of  democracy,  or  forensic  eloquence  of 
a  refined  civilization.     Preaching  was  to  Christianity  what  the  sword 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIl.  567 

was  tx)  Mohammedanism,  its  main  support,  both  at  its  origin  aud  in  aB 
its  subsequent  successes.  .  .  But  while  we  acknowledge  the  preemi- 
nent moral  authority  of  the  Christian  pulpit,  we  must  not  forget  the  in- 
tellectual results  which  we  undoubtedly  owe  to  it.  Long  after  ancient 
elocution  had  vanished  from  its  favorite  haunts  in  the  Pnyx  and  the 
Forum,  when  the  master-pieces  of  Cicero  and  Demosthenes  were  littlo 
read,  oratory  arose  again,  in  a  form,  truly,  cramped  and  mutilated, 
and  having  but  the  famtest  reflection  of  its  former  glory,  but  yet  liv- 
ing, and  prolific  of  life  in  others.  .  .  Indeed,  the  ultimate  effect  of  pubHc 
clerical  teaching  in  restoring,  both  in  the  Roman  Empire  and  in  the 
subsequent  barbarian  states,  a  taste  for  high  intellectual  pursuits, 
and  for  abstruse  speculation,  can  hardly  be  ignored  by  one  who  traces 
the  mental  development  of  the  European  nations." — [Henry  Macken- 
zie: ''The  Christian  Clergy  "  (Hulsean  Essay):  Cambridge  ed.,  1855: 
pp.  67-69. 

"Let  him  therefore  [the  Bishop]  be  well  educated,  skillful  in  the 
word,  and  of  competent  age.  .  .  Let  him  be  patient  and  gentle  in  his 
admonitions,  well  instructed  himself,  meditating  in  and  diligently 
studying  the  Lord's  books,  and  reading  them  frequently,  that  so  he 
may  be  able  carefully  to  interpret  the  Scriptures,  expounding  the 
Gospel  in  correspondence  with  the  prophets  and  with  the  law ;  and  let 
the  expositions  from  the  law  and  the  prophets  correspond  to  the  Gos- 
pel. .  .  Be  careful,  0  Bishop,  to  study  the  word,  that  thou  mayest  be 
able  to  explain  everything  exactly,  and  that  thou  mayest  copiously 
nourish  thy  people  with  much  doctrine,  and  enlighten  them  with  the 
light  of  the  law." — [Apostolical  Constitutions:  IE. :  1,  5. 

So  Bede  wrote  to  Egbert  of  York,  at  the  beginning  of  the  eighth 
century :  ' '  Because  the  spaces  belonging  to  your  diocese  are  too  exten- 
sive for  you  alone  to  be  able  to  go  through  them,  and  to  preach  the 
word  of  God  in  every  village  and  hamlet,  even  if  you  should  give  a 
whole  year  to  it,  it  is  plainly  necessary  that  you  appoint  others  as 
assistants  to  you  in  this  holy  work,  by  ordaining  priests,  and  by  insti- 
tuting teachers,  who  may  be  zealous  in  preaching  the  word  of  God  in 
every  village,  and  in  celebrating  the  heavenly  mysteries." — [Opera; 
London  ed.,  1843:  Vol.  1:  p.  114. 

In  the  same  spirit  the  Council  of  Aries  (a.d.  813)  commanded  the 
bishops  to  preach  in  the  scattered  villages,  as  well  as  in  towns. 

Merivale  seems  justified  in  attributing  important  secondary  conse- 
quences to  the  primitive  preaching  of  the  Gospel,  when  he  speaks  of 
"  those  itinerant  homilists  who  began,  from  the  Flavian  period,  to  go 
about  proclaiming  moral  truths,  collecting  groups  of  hearers,  and  sow- 
ing the  seed  of  spiritual  wisdom  and  knowledge  on  every  soil  that  could 
receive  it.  It  was  by  the  first  Christian  teachers  that  the  example  of 
this  predication  was  set;  and  the  effect  produced  on  thoughtful  spirits 


558  APPENDIX. 

by  the  conspicuous  career  of  St.  Paul  and  his  associates,  is  evinced,  tc 
my  apprehension,  by  the  self-imposed  mission  of  Apollonius  in  the 
second,  and  of  Dion  in  the  third  generation  after  them." — ["Histoi-y 
of  Romans  under  the  Empire  " ;  London  ed. ,  1862 :  Vol.  7 :  p.  458. 

XL VI. :  p.  237. — "  The  sources  of  the  apparent  oppositions  (contrari- 
eties) of  the  Scripture,  are  a  God  humbled,  even  unto  the  death  upon 
the  cross;  a  Messiah  triumphant  over  death,  by  his  own  death;  two 
natures  in  Jesus  Christ ;  two  advents ;  two  states  of  the  nature  of  man. 
.  .  But  in  Jesus  Christ  all  the  contradictions  are  brought  into  har- 
mony."—[Pascal:  "Pensees";  Paris  ed.,  1878:  Sec.  Par. :  Art.  IX. :  12. 

XL VII. :  p.  237. — Gibbon's  testimony  to  the  value  of  the  historical 
works  produced  in  the  monasteries,  is  certainly  that  of  an  unpreju- 
diced expert: — "The  consideration  of  our  past  losses  should  incite  the 
present  age  to  cherish  and  perpetuate  the  valuable  relics  which  have 
escaped,  instead  of  condemning  the  Monkish  Historians,  as  they  are 
contemptuously  styled,  to  moulder  in  the  dust  of  our  libraries;  our 
candor,  and  even  our  justice,  should  learn  to  estimate  their  value,  and 
to  excuse  their  imperfections.  Their  minds  were  infected  with  the 
passions  and  errors  of  their  times,  but  those  times  would  have  been  in- 
volved in  darkness,  had  not  the  art  of  wi'iting,  and  the  memory  of 
events,  been  preserved  in  the  peace  and  solitude  of  the  cloister.  .  .  In 
the  eyes  of  a  philosophic  observer,  these  monkish  historians  are  even 
endowed  with  a  singular,  though  accidental  merit:  the  unconscious 
simplicity  with  which  they  represent  the  mannei'S  and  opinions  of  their 
contemporaries ;  a  natural  picture,  which  the  most  exquisite  art  is  un- 
able to  imitate."— [Gibbon  :  Misc.  Works;  London  ed.,  1796  :  Vol.  2  : 
p.  708. 

XLVIII. :  p.  239. — The  knowledge  of  different  languages  and  the 
culture  of  different  branches  of  knowledge,  among  Christian  scholars, 
are  sometimes  attributed  to  the  influences  of  modern  commerce,  which 
is  itseK  largely  peculiar  to  Christendom.  It  is  to  be  noticed,  therefore, 
that  in  the  darkest  days  of  the  Middle  Age  the  same  tendencies  appeared. 
Thus  Bede  says  of  Tobias,  Bishop  of  Rochester,  that  "together  with 
his  erudition  in  ecclesiastical  and  general  Literature,  he  also  learned  the 
Greek  and  Latin  languages  so  perfectly  that  he  had  them  as  thorough- 
ly familiar  to  him  as  the  dialect  of  the  place  in  which  he  was  born." — 
[Hist.  Eccl. :  V. :  23. 

He  says  of  Theodore  and  Adrian,  who  were  teaching  in  England  in 
the  seventh  century: — "  Forasmuch  as  both  of  them  were,  as  we  have 
said,  abundantly  instructed  both  in  sacred  and  in  secular  literature, 
4aily  floods  of  salutary  knowledge  flowed  from  them  upon  the  crowds 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIL  55tf 

of  disciples  assembled  around  tliem,  watering  their  hearts;  and  thuj 
they  delivered  to  their  hearers  knowledge  of  ecclesiastical  poetry,  as 
tronomy,  arithmetic,  as  well  as  the  volumes  of  the  sacred  writings."— 
[IV. :  2. 

Guizot  presents  in  temperate  words  the  fine  intellectual  qualities  and 
attauunents  of  the  English  Alcuin : — "  He  is  a  theologian  by  profession, 
and  the  atmosphere  in  which  he  lives  [8th  century]  is  essentially  theo- 
logical ;  yet  the  theological  spirit  does  not  reign  alone  in  him,  but  his 
works  and  his  thoughts  also  tend  towards  philosophy,  and  the  ancient 
literature.  It  is  that  which  he  also  delights  in  studying,  teaching,  and 
which  he  wishes  to  revive.  Saint  Jerome  and  Saint  Augustine  are  very 
f amihar  to  him ;  but  Pythagoras,  Aristotle,  Aristippus,  Diogenes,  Pla- 
to, Homer,  Virgil,  Seneca,  Pliny,  also  occur  to  his  memory.  Tho 
greater  part  of  his  writings  are  theological ;  but  mathematics,  astrono« 
my,  logic,  rhetoric,  habitually  occupy  him.  He  is  a  monk,  a  deacon, 
the  light  of  the  contemporaneous  Church ;  but  he  is  at  the  same  time  a 
scholar,  a  classical  man  of  letters." — ["Hist,  of  Civilization";  New 
Yorked.,  Vol.  3  :  p.  54. 

About  A.D.  1141,  Peter  the  Venerable— friend  of  both  Bernard  and 
Abelard,  and  one  of  the  most  eminent  of  monks — had  the  Koran  trans- 
lated into  Latin,  that  it  might  be  refuted.  '  He  charged  with  the  labor 
Pierre  of  Toledo,  Herman  of  Dalmatia,  an  Englishman  named  Robert 
Kennet,  and  associated  with  them  an  Arabic  scholar,  and  his  o^vn  sec- 
retary, Pierre  of  Poitiers.  They  for  the  first  time  unveiled  to  Europe 
the  Mahometan  impostures,  which  he  then  proceeded  to  refute :  a  work,* 
— the  chronicler  rather  sharply  adds — '  perhaps  superfluous ;  since  books 
like  the  Koran  can  have  no  refutation  more  complete  than  that  given 
by  a  faithful  translation.' 

The  version  thus  made,  in  what  is  sometimes  styled  the  midnight  of 
Christendom,  held  its  place  in  Europe,  and  was  the  basis  of  other 
ti'anslations  into  modern  languages,  till  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury.— [See  "Histoire  Litteraire  de  la  France":  Tom.  XIII. :  pp.  245, 
259-60. 

XLIX. :  p.  239.— "A  certain  man,  who  was  perfectly  versed  in  Latin 
literature,  steeped  in  all  the  culture  and  nearly  all  the  passions  of  the 
Roman  world,  after  having  for  some  time  mastered  all  the  enlighten- 
ment and  gazed,  though  from  some  distance,  at  the  pleasures  of  that 
debased  society,  came  to  his  senses,  and  fled  in  terror  into  the  desert. 
.  .  To  subdue  himself,  and  conquer  the  flesh,  as  he  tells  us,  he  under- 
took the  study  of  Hebrew,  and  put  himself  under  the  tuition,  and  even 
at  the  service,  of  a  monk,  a  converted  Jew,  who  greedy  of  interpreta- 
tion taught  him  in  a  quarry  and  by  night,  for  fear  lest  his  countrymen 
•should  detect  him,  the  secrets  of  the  sacred  language.     'And  I,'  said 


560  APPENDIX. 

he,  *  all  nourislied  as  I  still  was  with  the  flower  of  Cicero's  eloquence^, 
with  the  sweetness  of  Pliny  and  Fronto,  and  the  charm  of  Virgil,  be- 
gan  to  stammer  harsh  and  breath-disturbing  words,  stridentia  anhe- 
lantiaque  verba.  I  tied  myself  down  to  that  difficult  language  like  » 
slave  to  a  mill-stone, buried  myself  in  the  darkness  of  that  bai'barous  idiom 
like  a  miner  in  a  cavern,  in  which  after  a  long  time  he  at  last  }>erceivea 
a  gleam  of  light.  So,  in  its  obscure  depths,  I  began  to  find  unknow:* 
joys,  and  later,  from  the  bitter  seed-time  of  my  study  I  gathered  in 
fruits  of  an  infinite  sweetness. '  .  .  Thus  was  produced  the  translation  o\ 
the  Old  Testament  into  Latin,  named  the  Vulgate,  which  was  one  of  the 
greatest  achievements  of  the  human  mind.  Through  its  means  the 
whole  current  of  the  Eastern  genius  entered,  so  to  speak,  into  the 
Roman  civilization." — [Fred.  Ozanam  :  "Hist,  of  Civilization  in  Fifth 
Cent.";  London  ed.,  1867  :  Vol.  2  :  pp.  98-9,  100. 

L. :  p.  240. — "The  youth  and  early  manhood  of  Socrates  fall  in  the 
most  brilliant  period  of  Grecian  history.  Bom  during  the  last  years 
of  the  Persian  war,  he  was  nearly  contemporary  with  all  those  great 
men  who  adorned  the  age  of  Pericles.  As  a  citizen  of  Athens  he  partici- 
pated in  all  those  elements  of  culture  which,  thanks  to  its  unrivalled 
fertility  of  thought,  congregated  in  the  great  metropolis.  If  poverty, 
and  low  birth,  somewhat  impeded  his  using  them,  still,  in  the  Athens 
of  Pericles,  not  even  the  lowest  on  the  city  roll  was  debarred  from  en- 
joying the  rich  profusion  of  art,  which  was  for  the  most  part  devoted 
to  the  pui'poses  of  the  state,  nor  yet  from  associating  with  men  in  the 
highest  ranks  of  life.  This  free  pei'sonal  intercourse  did  far  more  to 
advance  intellectual  culture  at  that  time  than  teaching  in  schools." — 
[Zeller  :  "Socrates";  London  ed.,  1877  :  pp.  53-55. 

"Pericles  gave  you,  Alcibiades,  for  a  tutor,  Zophyrus  the  Thracian, 
a  slave  of  his  with  whom  he  could  do  nothing  else.  .  .  I  have  only  io 
remark,  byway  of  contrast  [with  the  Persians],  that  no  one  cares  about 
your  bu'th,  or  nurture,  or  education,  or,  I  may  say,  about  those  of  any 
other  Athenian,  unless  he  has  a  lover  who  takes  care  of  him." — 
[Socrates  :  in  Alcibiades  I. :  122. 

"  It  was  a  witty  and  handsome  jeer  which  Aristippus  bestowed  on  a 
sottish  Father  who  asked  him  what  he  would  take  to  teach  his  child. 
He  answered,  'a  thousand  di'achmas,'  whereupon  the  other  cried  out, 
'  O  Hercules,  what  a  price !  I  can  buy  a  slave  at  that  rate ! '  '  Do  so, 
then,'  said  the  philosopher,  'and  thou  wilt  have  two  slaves  instead  of 
one  :  thy  son,  and  him  whom  thou  buyest.'" — [Plutarch  :  "Morals"; 
Boston  ed.,  1874  :  Vol.  1  :  p.  11. 

LI.:  p.  241. — "When  Cameades  the  Academic,  and  Diogenes  the 
Stoic,  came  as  deputies  from  Athens  to  Eome,   .   .   the  gracefulness  gA 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  561 

Carneades'  oratory  gathered  large  and  favorable  audiences,  and  ere 
long  filled  like  a  wind  all  the  city  with  the  sound  of  it ;  so  that  the  young 
men,  quitting  all  their  pleasures  and  pastimes,  ran  mad,  as  it  were, 
after  philosophy;  which  much  pleased  the  Romans  in  general.  But 
Cato,  on  the  other  side,  seeing  this  passion  for  words  flowing  into  the 
city,  from  the  beginning  took  it  ill,  fearing  lest  the  youth  should  be 
diverted  that  way,  and  should  prefer  the  glory  of  speaking  well  before 
that  of  arms,  and  of  doing  well;  .  .  and  to  frighten  his  son  from  any 
thing  that  was  Grreek,  in  a  more  vehement  tone  than  became  one  of 
his  age,  he  pronounced,  as  it  were  with  the  voice  of  an  oracle,  that  the 
Romans  would  be  certainly  destroyed  when  they  once  began  to  be  in- 
fected with  Greek  literature.  "—[Plutarch  :  ' '  Lives  " ;  Boston  ed. ,  1859 ; 
Vol.  2  :  pp.  345-6. 

LII. :  p.  241. — Mr.  Brace  gives  significant  examples  of  the  care  of 
Christian  people  for  the  education  of  the  young,  in  the  early  and  later 
Middle  Age : — 

"  The  Council  of  Vaison  (529  A.D.)  thus  treats  of  education:  *  It  hath 
seemed  good  to  us  that  priests  with  parishes  should  receive  into  their 
houses  young  readers  to  whom  they  give  spiritual  nourishment,  teach- 
ing them  to  study,  to  attach  themselves  to  holy  books,  and  to  know 
the  law  of  God.'  The  Synod  of  Orleans  thus  exhorts  (799  a.d.),  '  Let 
the  priests  in  villages  and  towns  hold  schools,  that  all  the  children  en- 
trusted to  them  may  receive  the  first  notion  of  letters.  Let  them  take 
no  money  for  their  lessons.'  The  Council  of  Chalons  (813  A.D.)  de- 
creed that  bishops  should  establish  schools,  where  both  literature  and 
Scripture  should  be  taught.  Another  Council  proclaimed  (859  a.d.), 
— 'Let  one  I'aise,  everywhere,  public  schools,  that  the  Church  of 
God  may  everywhere  ga,ther  the  double  fruit  of  religion.'  .  ,  A  Coun- 
cil proclaims  (1179  a.d.)  :  '  In  order  that  the  poor  may  have  the  possi- 
bility of  learning  to  read  and  wto  be  instructed,  we  appoint  in  every 
cathedral  church  a  master  to  instruct  clerks  and  poor  scholars;  but 
let  no  one  demand  pay  for  teaching.'  " — ["  Gesta  Christi";  New  York 
ed.,1882:  pp.  219,  222. 

To  these  may  be  added  such  other  instances  as  that  of  the  Council 
of  Orleans,  a.d.  533,  forbidding  any  unlettered  person  to  be  ordained 
priest  or  deacon;  or  the  Council  of  Paris,  a.d.  824,  ordering  bishops  to 
watch  'jver  the  schools  with  care,  and  to  summon  scholars  to  the  pro- 
vincial councils ;  also  calling  on  the  king  to  establish  central  schools 
in  three  important  places,  that  his  efforts,  and  those  of  his  father,  be 
not  fruitless.  The  circular  Letter  of  Charlemagne  illustrates  the  same 
tendency,  in  which  he  requires  that  in  bishoprics  and  monasteries 
*'Care  be  taken  not  only  to  live  orderly,  according  to  our  religion, 
but  to  instruct  in  the  knowledge  of  letters,  and  according  to  the  capao- 
86 


562  APPENDIi:. 

ity  of  individuals,  all  such  as  are  able  and  willing  to  learn  with  God'i 
help.  For  though  of  the  two,"  says  the  Emperor,  "  it  is  better  to  be 
good  than  to  be  learned,  yet  to  have  knowledge  leads  to  being  goody — 
[See  Guizot:  "  Hist,  of  Civilization";  New  York  ed.,  Vol.  3:  p.  38. 

LIII. :  p.  242. — "At  the  epoch  of  which  we  speak,  or  about  the  year 
1100,  there  was  no  University  of  Paris.  There  were  schools  there ;  and 
among  them  the  Episcopal  school,  having  precedence  of  all  others, 
most  famous  and  most  frequented.  To  that  scholars  came  from  a 
great  distance— not  from  France  only,  which  would  be  saying  little, 
but  from  the  whole  of  Gaul,  and  from  foreign  countries.  England, 
Italy,  and  Germany  began  to  send  their  youth  to  this  city,  which  waa 
destined  to  become  the  Athens  of  the  philosophy  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
The  courses  of  the  school,  what  we  should  call  the  Lectures,  had  for 
an  audience  both  young  persons  and  mature  men  of  all  these  nations; 
for  the  scholars  were  then  of  all  ages.  They  gathered  around  the  chair 
of  the  professor,  in  a  cloister  near  the  house  of  the  bishop,  where  we 
have  still  seen  the  archbishop's  palace,  at  the  base  of  the  metropolitan 
Church  which  was  already  named  Notre  Dame,  but  which  was  by  no 
means  the  same  magnificent  and  venerable  monument  that  Maurice  de 
Sully  commenced  under  Philip  Augustus.  .  .  This  is  that  which  bore 
in  the  world,  and  which  preserves  in  history,  the  name  of  the  '  School 
of  the  Cloister,'  or  '  of  Notre  Dame.'  It  specially  prided  itself  on  rec- 
ognizing as  its  chief  WiQiam,  named  of  Champeaux,  from  the  name 
of  the  market-town  of  Brie,  where  he  was  bom.  Archdeacon  of  Paris, 
he  taught  with  great  success  and  eclat.  He  appears  to  have  shone 
particularly  in  dialectics,  and  first  applied  in  this  school  the  forms  of 
logic  to  the  illustration  of  sacred  things.  They  called  him  '  The  col- 
umn among  teachers.'  "—[Charles  de  Remusat:  "Abelard";  Paris  ed., 
1845:  Tom.  1:  pp.  9-11. 

A  further  graphic  account  is  given  of  this  nascent  University  in  the 
Cite,  as  it  appeared  a  few  years  later,  in  the  shade  of  the  churches,  in  the 
sombre  cloisters,  in  the  large  halls,  or  on  the  green  turf  of  the  yards — 
a  description  too  long  to  be  quoted  :  pp.  40-44. 

LIV. :  p.  242.— The  dangers  which  constantly  menaced  the  monas- 
teries, and  the  struggle  for  existence  which  they  had  to  maintain,  are 
fairly  illustrated  in  the  History  of  the  Abbey  of  Croyland,  by  Ingul- 
phus-,  and  its  continuations.  According  to  these  chronicles,  the  abbey, 
founded  by  Ethelbald,  A.D.  716,  in  the  following  centuries,  up  to  a.d. 
1486,  had  been  plundered  five  times  by  Saxons,  Danes,  and  Normans: 
had  seven  times  suffered  from  severe  extortions  and  spoliations,  of 
barons  and  kings :  had  six  times  been  attacked  by  the  populace  of  the 
neighbourhood,  had  once  been  accidentally  burned,  once  shaken  and 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VII.  563 

•split  by  an  earthquake,  and  had  twice  been  flooded  by  an  unusual  rise 
of  water.  That  it  maintained  its  life  shows  that  something  more  than 
selfish  ease  and  lazy  luxury  was  contemplated  by  it. 

It  is  claimed  by  the  chronicle  that  from  this  Abbey  arose  the  Uni- 
versity of  Cambridge.  Of  the  Abbot  Joffrid,  a.d.  1109,  it  is  said:  '* He 
was  a  man  more  learned  than  any  of  his  predecessors  [abbots],  having 
imbibed  literature  of  every  description  from  his  very  cradle,  with  his 
mother's  milk.  .  .  He  sent  to  his  manor  of  Cottenham,  near  Cam- 
bridge, the  lord  Gislebert,  his  fellow-monk,  and  professor  of  Saci^ 
Theology,  together  with  three  other  monks  who  had  accompanied  him 
into  England ;  who,  being  very  well  instructed  in  philosophical  the- 
orems, and  other  primitive  sciences,  went  every  day  to  Cambridge,  and 
having  hired  a  public  barn  there,  openly  taught  their  respective  sci- 
ences, and  in  a  short  space  of  time  collected  a  great  concourse  of 
scholars.  For  in  the  second  year  after  their  arrival,  the  number  of 
their  scholars,  from  both  the  country  and  the  town,  had  increased  to 
such  a  degree  that  not  even  the  largest  house  or  barn,  nor  any  church 
even,  was  able  to  contain  them.  .  .  From  this  little  spring,  which  has 
increased  into  a  great  river,  we  now  behold  the  city  of  God  made  glad, 
and  the  whole  of  England  rendered  fruitful  by  many  teachers  and 
doctors  going  forth  from  Cambridge,  after  the  likeness  of  the  most 
holy  Paradise." — [Ingulphus:  "Chronicle";  London  ed.,  1854:  pp. 
234-9. 

LV. :  p.  242.— Mr.  Hallam  says  with  apparent  justice  of  the  Saracen 
"  universities,"  at  Cordova,  Granada,  and  elsewhere,  that  "  they  were 
more  like  ordinary  schools  or  gymnasia  than  universities ;  and  it  is 
difficult  to  perceive  that  they  suggested  anything  peculiarly  character- 
istic of  the  latter  institutions,  which  are  much  more  reasonably  con- 
sidered as  the  development  of  a  native  germ,  planted  by  a  few  generous 
men,  above  all  by  Charlemagne,  in  that  inclement  season  which  was 
passing  away. "—["Lit.  of  Europe":  London  ed.,  1847:  Vol.  1 :  p.  17. 

LYI.  :  p.  242. — "He  [Hadrian]  established  a  university  at  Rome, 
under  the  name  of  the  Athenaeum,  after  the  type  of  the  cherished  city 
whence  it  derived  its  name,  and  he  endowed  its  professors  on  a  scale 
befitting  its  metropolitan  character.  The  throne  of  rhetoric  at  Rome 
took  precedence  of  all  its  rivals,  both  in  rank  and  emolument.  But 
the  liberal  sciences  were  exotics  in  Italy,  and  produced  no  popular 
teachers,  and  no  celebrated  schools.  The  activity  of  the  Roman  mind 
was  running  toward  law  and  jurisprudence  ;  but  this  was  a  practical 
subject  which  formed  no  part  of  the  speculations  to  which  the  career 
of  academic  study  was  prescriptively  confmed." — [IVIerivale:  "  Hist,  of 
the  Romans";  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  7:  pp.  487-9. 


564  APPENDIX. 

LVII  :  p.  243. — ''The  most  successful  missionaries  have  been  exactly 
those  whose  names  are  remembered  with  gratitude,  not  only  by  the 
natives  among  whom  they  labored,  but  also  by  the  savants  of  Europe; 
and  the  labors  of  the  Jesuit  missionaries  in  India  and  China,  of  the 
Baptist  missionaries  at  Serampore,  of  Gogerly  and  Spence  Hardy  in 
Ceylon,  of  Caldwell  in  Tinnevelly,  of  Wilson  in  Bombay,  of  Moffat, 
Krapf,  and  last  but  not  least  of  Livingstone,  Avill  live  not  only  in  the 
journals  of  oui  academies,  but  likewise  in  the  annals  of  the  mission- 
ary church.  .  .  Even  if  he  [Dr.  Legge]  had  not  converted  a  single 
Chinese,  he  would,  after  completing  the  work  which  he  has  just  begun, 
have  rendered  most  important  aid  to  the  introduction  of  Christianity 
into  China.  .  .  After  sixteen  years  of  assiduous  study,  Dr.  Legge  had 
explored  the  principal  works  of  Chinese  literature;  and  he  then  felt 
that  he  could  render  the  course  of  reading  through  which  he  had 
passed  more  easy  to  those  who  were  to  follow  after  him  by  publishing, 
on  the  model  of  our  editions  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  classics,  a  criti- 
cal text  of  the  classics  of  China,  together  witlji  a  translation,  and  ex- 
planatory notes." — [Max  Mliller:  "Chips,  etc.";  Vol.  1:  pp.  301-3. 

LVIII. :  p.  243. — "There  are  many  moral  precepts  equally  com- 
manded and  enforced  in  common  by  both  creeds.  It  will  not  be 
deemed  rash  to  assert  that  most  of  the  moral  truths  prescribed  by  the 
Gospel  are  to  be  met  with  in  the  Buddhistic  scriptures.  The  essential, 
vital,  and  capital  discrepancy  lies  in  the  difference  of  the  ends  to 
which  the  two  creeds  lead,  but  not  in  the  variance  of  the  means  they 
prescribe  for  the  attainment  of  them.  .  .  Buddhism  tends  to  abstract 
man  from  all  th^t  is  without  self,  and  makes  self  his  own  and  sole 
centre.  It  exhorts  him  to  the  practice  of  many  eminent  virtues,  which 
are  to  help  him  to  rise  to  an  imaginary  perfection,  the  summit  of 
which  is  the  incomprehensible  state  of  Neibban.  It  would  be  more 
correct  to  say  at  once  that  the  pretended  perfect  being  is  led,  by  the 
principles  of  his  creed,  into  the  dark  and  fathomless  abyss  of  annihila- 
tion."— [Bishop  Bigandet:  "  Legend  of  Gaudama  ":  London  ed.,  1880: 
Vol.  2:  p.  258. 

LIX. :  p.  243. — "  Considering  that  the  nations  of  Europe  can  scarcely 
be  said  to  have  possessed  a  dramatic  literature  before  the  fourteenth 
or  fifteenth  century  of  the  present  era,  the  great  age  of  the  Hindu  plays 
would  of  itself  be  a  most  interesting  and  attractive  circumstance, 
even  if  their  poetical  merit  were  not  of  a  very  high  order.  But  when 
to  the  antiquity  of  these  productions  is  added  their  extreme  beauty  and 
excellence  as  literary  compositions,  .  .  we  are  led  to  wonder  that  the 
study  of  the  Indian  drama  has  not  commended  itself  in  a  greater  degree 
to  the  attention  of  Europeans,  and  especially  of  Englishmen.  .  .  But 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIL  565 

it  is  not  in  India  alone  that  the  '  Sakoontala '  is  known  and  admired.  Its 
excellence  is  now  recognized  in  every  literary  circle  throughout  the 
continent  of  Europe ;  and  its  beauties,  if  not  yet  universally  known 
and  appreciated,  are  at  least  acknowledged  by  many  learned  men  in 
every  country  of  the  civilized  world.  .  .  The  English  reader,  remem- 
bering that  the  author  of  the  Sakoontala  lived  in  the  century  preced- 
ing the  Christian  era,  will  at  least  be  inclined  to  wonder  at  the  analo- 
gies which  it  offers  to  our  own  dramatic  composition  of  fifteen  or  six- 
teen centuries  later."— [Monier  Williams:  Introduction  to  "Sakoon- 
tala"; London  ed.,  1872. 
It  was  of  this  ancient  Indian  poem  that  Goethe  wrote: — 

"  Wouldst  thou  the  yonng  year's  blossoms  and  the  fruits  of  its  decline, 
"And  all  by  which  the  soul  is  charmed,  enraptured,  feasted,  fed, — 

*'  Wouldst  thou  the  earth  and  heaven  itself  in  one  sole  name  combine  ? 
"  I  name  thee,  0  Sakoontala!  and  all  at  once  is  said  !  " 

[See  "  Werke":  1882:  Band  I. :  S.  187. 

LX.  :  p.  244. — "There  were  sweeping  changes  in  the  range  and 
character  of  the  Germanic  dialects  during  those  ages  of  migration  and 
strife,  when  Germany  and  Eome  were  carrying  on  their  life  and  death 
struggle.  Whole  branches  of  the  German  race,  among  them  some 
of  the  most  renowned  and  mighty,  as  the  Goths  and  Vandals,  whoUy 
lost  their  existence  as  separate  communities,  being  scattered  and  ab- 
sorbed into  other  communities,  and  their  languages  also  ceased  to  ex- 
ist. Leagues  and  migrations,  intestine  struggles  and  foreign  con- 
quests, produced  fusions  and  absorptions,  extensions,  contractions,  and 
extinctions,  in  manifold  variety,  but  without  any  tendency  to  a  gen- 
eral unity;  and  three  centuries  and  a  lialf  ago,  when  the  modern  Ger- 
man first  put  forth  its  claim  to  stand  as  the  common  language  of  Ger- 
many, there  was  in  that  country  the  same  Babel  of  discordant  speech 
as  at  the  Christian  era.  .  .  To  a  language  so  accredited  [as  the  official 
speech  in  Central  and  Southern  Germany]  the  internal  impulse  of  the 
religious  excitement  and  the  political  revolutions  accompanying  it,  and 
the  external  influence  of  the  press,  which  brought  its  literature,  and 
especially  Luther's  translation  of  the  Bible,  into  every  reading  family, 
were  enough  to  give  a  common  currency,  a  general  value.  From  that 
time  to  the  present,  its  influence  and  power  have  gone  on  increasing 
It  is  the  vehicle  of  literature  and  instruction  everywhere." — [W.  D. 
Whitney:  "  The  Study  of  Language  " ;  New  York  ed. ,  1867 :  pp.  162-3. 

LXI. :  p.  245.—"  Of  all  the  English  deistical  works  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  the  influence  of  two  and  only  two  survived  the  controversy. 
Hume's  Essay  on  Miracles,  though  certainly  not  unquestioned  and  un- 
assailed,  cannot  be  looked  upon  as  obsolete  or  uninfluential.     Gibbon 


566  APPENDIX. 

remains  the  almost  undisputed  master  of  his  own  field,  but  his  great 
work  does  not  directly  involve,  though  it  undoubtedly  trenches  on,  the 
subject  of  Christian  evidences.  But  if  we  except  these  two,  it  would  be 
difficult  to  conceive  a  more  complete  eclipse  than  the  English  deists 
have  undergone.  Woolston  and  Tindal,  Collins  and  Chubb,  have 
long  since  passed  into  the  land  of  shadows,  and  their  works  have 
mouldered  in  the  obscurity  of  forgetfulness.  Bolmgbroke  is  now  little- 
more  than  a  brilliant  name,  and  all  the  beauties  of  his  matchless  style 
have  been  unable  to  preserve  his  philosophy  from  oblivion.  Shaftes- 
bury retains  a  certain  place  as  one  of  the  few  disciples  of  idealism  who 
resisted  the  influence  of  Locke ;  but  his  importance  is  purely  historical. 
.  .  The  shadow  of  the  tomb  rests  upon  them  all ;  a  deep  unbroken  silence, 
the  chill  of  death,  surrounds  them.  They  have  long  since  ceased  ta 
wake  any  interest,  or  to  suggest  any  enquiries,  or  to  impart  any  im- 
pulse to  the  intellect  of  England."— [Lecky:  "History  of  Rational- 
ism"; New  York  ed.,  1882:  Vol.  1:  pp.  189-190. 

LXII. :  p.  245. — "  This  fitness  of  our  religion  to  more  advanced  stages 
of  society  than  that  in  which  it  was  introduced,  to  wants  of  human 
nature  not  then  developed,  seems  to  me  very  striking.  The  religion 
bears  the  marks  of  having  come  from  a  being  who  perfectly  under- 
stood the  human  mind,  and  had  power  to  provide  for  its  progress. 
This  feature  of  Christianity  is  of  the  nature  of  prophecy.  It  was  an 
anticipation  of  future  and  distant  ages ;  and  when  we  consider  among 
whom  our  religion  sprung,  where,  but  in  God,  can  we  find  an  explana- 
tion of  this  peculiarity?" — [Dr.  Charming:  Works;  Boston  ed.,  1843: 
Vol.  3:  p.  130. 

"  If  there  dwell  in  the  midst  [of  the  Christian  Scriptures]  a  divine 
productive  element,  the  further  it  passes  from  the  moment  of  its  nativ- 
ity, the  clearer  and  more  august  will  it  appear.  It  is  like  the  seed 
dropped  at  first  on  an  unprepared  and  luiexpectant  ground ;  which  in 
its  earliest  development  yields  but  a  struggling  and  scanty  growth,  but 
each  season,  as  another  generation  of  leaves  falls  from  the  boughs,  be- 
comes the  source,  through  richer  nutriment,  of  fuller  forms;  till  at 
length,  when  it  has  spread  the  foliage  of  ages,  making  its  own  soil, 
and  deepening  the  luxuriance  of  its  own  roots,  a  forest  in  all  its  glory 
covers  the  land,  and  waves  in  magnificence  over  continents  once  bare 
of  life  and  beauty.  So  it  is  with  the  germ  of  divine  truth  cast  upon 
the  inhospitable  conditions  of  history ;  it  is  small  and  feeble  in  its  ear- 
lier day ;  but  when  it  has  provided  the  aliment  of  its  own  growth,  and 
shed  its  reproductive  treasures  on  the  congenial  mind  of  genei'ations 
and  races,  it  starts  into  the  proportions  of  a  Christendom,  and  become* 
the  shade  and  shelter  of  a  world." — [James  Martineau:  "Studies  of 
Christianity";  Boston  ed.,  1866:  pp.  296-7. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII. 

Note  I. :  page  250. — "  It  [Corinth]  was  celebrated  for  maintaining 
the  character  of  a  highly  polished  and  literary  society,  such  as  (even 
without  taking  into  account  its  connexion  with  Greek  civilization  gen- 
erally) furnishes  a  natural  basis  for  much  both  of  the  praise  and  blame 
with  which  the  Fii-st  Epistle  abounds,  in  regard  to  intellectual  gifts. 
'  At  Corinth  you  would  learn  and  hear  even  from  inanimate  objects ' 
—so  said  a  Greek  teacher  within  a  century  from  this  time — '  so  great 
are  the  treasures  of  literature  in  every  direction,  wherever  you  do  but 
glance,  both  in  the  streets  themselves  and  in  the  colonnades ;  not  to 
speak  of  the  gymnasia  and  schools,  and  the  general  spiiit  of  instruction 
and  inquiry.'  " — [Dean  Stanley:  "  Comm.  on  Epistles  to  Corinthians  "; 
London  ed.,  1876:  p.  6. 

II. :  p.  252. — "  Of  the  general  aspect  of  the  city  of  Rome  during  the 
first  years  of  its  existence,  we  can,  of  course,  form  only  a  conjectural 
notion.  It  probably  consisted  of  an  irregular  collection  of  thatched 
cottages,  similar  to  that  shown  in  later  times  as  the  Casa  Romuli,  on  the 
Palatine,  among  which  were  interspersed  a  few  diminutive  chapels.  .  . 
He  [Dionysius]  says  that  the  hut  of  Romulus  lay  in  a  hollow  on  the 
side  of  the  Palatine  which  looks  toward  the  Circus  Maximus ;  and  Plu- 
tarch places  it  on  the  descent  from  the  Palatine  to  the  Circus.  .  .  It 
was  a  hut  made  of  wood,  and  covered  with  reeds,  representing  the 
original  habitation  of  the  founder  of  Rome.  It  must  have  stood  nearly 
at  the  western  corner  of  the  hill." — [Burn:  "Rome  and  the  Cam- 
pagna";  London  ed.,  1871:  pp.  xxiv,  156. 

III. :  p.  252. — "  He  [Augustus]  lived  at  first  near  the  Roman  Forum, 
above  the  Scalce  anularioe,  in  a  house  which  had  been  that  of  the 
orator  Calvus ;  afterward  on  the  Palatine,  but  yet  in  a  moderate  house 
belonging  to  Hortensius,  neither  conspicuous  for  spaciousness  nor  for 
ornament ;  in  which  the  piazzas  were  small,  with  columns  of  the  Al- 
ban  stone,  and  the  rooms  were  without  any  marbles  or  any  remarkable 
pavement." — [Suetonius:  "Octav.  August.":  Lxxn. 

IV.  :  p.  253. — Lactantius,  for  example,  quotes  thus: — "Under  the 
•influence  of  the  same  error  (for  who  could  keep  the  right  course  when 

mi) 


568  APPENDIA\ 

Cicero  is  in  error?)  Seneca  said:  'Philosophy  is  nothing  else  thar 
the  right  method  of  living,  or  the  science  of  living  honorably,  or  the  art 
of  passing  a  good  life.'  "  This,  Lactantius  controverts,  on  the  ground, 
among  others,  that  if  philosophy  were  needful  to  form  the  life,  none 
but  philosophers  would  be  good  men,  and  they  always  would  be; 
against  which  he  then  cites  testimonies  of  Seneca  himself. — [Div.  Inst. 
Til. :  XV. 

Augustine  quotes  from  him  more  largely  in  the  Civ.  Dei,  v. :  8 ;  VI. : 
10,  11;  and  elsewhere;  but  he  indicates  no  suspicion  that  he  had  re* 
ceived  any  distinct  influences  from  Christianity. 

The  expression  of  Jerome  takes  special  emphasis  from  the  fact  that 
in  the  same  part  of  the  same  treatise  he  speaks  of  other  writers  with 
praise:  as  of  Varius  Geminius,  whom  he  styles  'the  sublime  orator,' 
of  Theophrastus,  one  of  whose  books  he  calls  '  golden ' ;  while  he  men- 
tions, also,  Cicero,  Socrates,  Cato  the  Censor,  Herodotus,  Chrysippus, 
Aristotle,  Plutarch,  and  others.  But  only  of  Seneca  does  he  speak  as 
"  our  own,"  while  from  him  he  also  largely  quotes. — [Opera:  S.  Hter- 
onymi;  Cologne,  1616:  Tom.  I.:  p.  136. 

V. :  p.  253. — "If  the  wise  man  had  this  very  ring  [of  Gyges,  making 
him  invisible]  he  would  think  himself  no  more  at  liberty  to  sin  than 
if  he  had  it  not.  .  .  This  is  the  meaning  of  tliis  ring,  and  this  exam- 
ple :  if  no  one  should  know,  no  one  even  suspect,  when  you  have  done 
anything  for  the  sake  of  riches,  power,  domination,  lust,  if  it  should 
be  forever  unknown  to  gods  and  men,  you  may  not  do  it." — [De  Offi- 
ciis:  III.:  9. 

VI.:  p.  253. — "I  am  accustomed  to  look  upon  his  chamber  itself 
[of  T.  Aristo],his  very  couch,  as  reflecting  the  image  of  ancient  frugal- 
ity. The  magnanimity  of  Ms  soul  adorns  them,  which  has  no  regard 
to  ostentatious  display,  but  refers  all  things  to  the  judgment  of  con- 
science ;  which  seeks  the  reward  of  right  action  not  at  aU  in  popular 
applause,  but  in  the  action  itself." — [Ep.  I. :  22. 

Vll. :  p.  254. — "  Let  us  then  say  also  to  ourselves  :  '  Thy  body,  0 
man,  naturally  of  itself  breeds  many  diseases  and  passions,  and  many 
it  receives  befalling  it  from  without;  but  if  thou  shalt  open  thy  inte- 
rior, thou  wilt  find  a  certain  various  and  abundantly  furnished  store- 
house and  (as  Democritus  says)  treasury  of  evils,  not  flowing  into  it 
from  abroad,  but  having  as  it  were  their  inbred  and  original  springs, 
which  vice,  exceedingly  affluent  and  rich  in  passions,  causes  to  break 
forth.  Now,  whereas  the  diseases  in  the  flesh  are .  discerned  by  the 
pulses,  and  the  flushings  in  the  color  of  the  skin,  and  discovered  by 
unusual  heats  and  sudden  pains,  and  these  maladies  of  the  soul  lie  hid 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  569- 

from  many  wlio  are  affected  with  them ;  these  are  therefore  worse,  as 
removing  from  them  the  sense  of  the  patient." — [Plutarch :  ''Morals " ; 
Boston  ed.,  1874:  Vol.  4:  p.  505. 

VIII. :  p.  254. — "  Varro,  in  one  of  his  satires,  enumerates  the  follow- 
ing as  the  most  notable  foreign  delicacies :  peacocks  from  Samos ;  grouso 
from  Phrygia ;  cranes  from  Melos ;  kids  from  Ambracia ;  tunny-fiijhes 
from  Chalcedon ;  muraenas  from  the  Straits  of  Gades :  ass-fishes  (?  aselli) 
from  Pessinus ;  oysters  and  scallops  from  Tarentmn ;  sturgeons  from 
Rhodes;  scares- fishes  (?)  from  Cilicia;  nuts  from  Thasos;  dates  from. 
Egypt;  acorns  from  Spain." — [Mommsen:  "  Hist,  of  Rome";  London 
ed.,  1868:  Vol.  4:  p.  543  (note). 

The  fourth  Satire  of  Horace,  Lib.  II.,  gives  many  further  particu- 
lars of  the  preferences  of  the  Roman  epicures  for  meats  and  esculents 
of  various  sorts,  for  wines  and  fruits ;  and  the  eighth  Satire,  in  the 
same  book,  describes  the  ridiculous  imitations  of  great  feasts  by  those 
of  more  economical  habits. 

"  The  Talmud  does  indeed  offer  us  a  perfect  picture  of  the  cosmopol- 
itanism and  luxury  of  those  final  days  of  Rome,  such  as  but  few  class- 
ical or  post-classical  writings  contain.  We  find  mention  made  of 
Spanish  fish,  of  Cretan  apples,  Bithynian  cheese,  Egyptian  lentils  and 
beans,  Greek  and  Egyptian  pumpkins,  Italian  wine.  Median  beer,  Egyp- 
tian zyphus :  garments  were  imported  from  Pelusium  and  India,  shirts 
from  Cilicia,  and  veils  from  Arabia. " — [Deutsch :  * '  Lit.  Remains  " ;  New 
York  ed.,  1874:  p.  44. 

IX. :  p.  254. — "  No  one  in  that  court  vied  with  another  in  probity  or 
industry ;  there  was  one  only  road  to  power,  by  prodigious  feasts,  and 
in  seeking,  at  enormous  expense  and  by  the  coarse  profligacy  of  the  cook- 
shop,  to  satisfy  the  insatiable  appetites  of  Vitellius.  He,  abundantly 
satisfied  if  he  might  enjoy  whatever  was  before  him,  and  taldng  no 
thought  for  anything  further,  is  beheved  to  have  spent  in  a  very  few 
months  nine  hundred  thousand  great  sesterces"  [$36,000,000]. — [Taci- 
tus: "Histor.":  IL:  95. 

X. :  p.  255. — "Do  not  wonder  that  diseases  are  innumerable.  Count 
the  cooks  !  All  study  ceases ;  and  the  professors  of  liberal  learning  pre- 
side in  deserted  nooks,  without  any  attendants.  There  is  solitude  in 
the  schools  of  rhetoricians  and  philosophers  ;  but  how  celebrated  are 
the  kitchens  I  what  a  crowd  of  youth  presses  around  the  fire-places  of 
spendthrifts  !  .  .  Good  Gods  !  what  a  host  of  men  one  belly  keeps 
busy  !"— [Seneca:  Ep.  xcv. :  23-4. 

The  philosopher's  mention  of  the  fish,  a  large  mullet  weighing  more 
than  four  pounds,  bought  by  Octavius  for  five  thousand  sesterces,  is  in- 
the  same  Epistle:  43. 


570  APPENDIX. 

*'  From  every  quarter  they  assemble  all  things  designed  for  a  dis- 
dainful palate.  What  a  stomach  impaired  by  delicacies  scarcely  will 
admit,  that  is  brought  from  the  remotest  ocean.  They  vomit,  that 
they  may  eat;  they  eat,  that  they  may  vomit:  and  they  do  not  think 
the  feasts  for  which  they  search  through  all  the  world  worthy  even  of 
being  digested.  .  .  Caius  Caesar,  whom  the  nature  of  things  seems  to 
me  to  have  produced  in  order  to  show  of  what  the  highest  wickedness 
is  capable  in  the  midst  of  the  highest  fortune,  spent  at  the  supper  of 
one  day  $350,000;  and  being  assisted  in  the  business  by  everybody's 
wit,  yet  hardly  found  how  to  make  way  at  that  one  supper  with  the 
entire  tribute  of  three  provinces." — [Seneca:  Consol.  ad  Helv.  IX. 

XI. :  p.  255. — Even  Pliny  the  Younger  wrote  of  the  customary  ac- 
companiments of  the  feasts  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  without  condem- 
nation : — 

"  I  have  received  your  letter,  hi  which  you  complain  of  the  disgust 
which  you  felt  at  a  certain  very  magnificent  entertainment,  because 
jesters,  indecent  dancers,  and  buffoons,  wandered  about  among  the 
tables.  Will  you  not  relax  something  of  your  frown  ?  Certainly,  I 
have  nothing  of  the  sort ;  but  I  bear  with  those  who  have.  Why  do 
I  not  have  them  ?  Because  nothing  charms  me  as  surprising  or  gay 
when  anything  lascivious  is  offered  by  the  dancer,  anything  smart  by 
the  jester,  or  silly  by  the  buffoon.  I  am  showing  you  not  my  judg- 
ment, but  my  special  taste,  in  the  matter.  .  .  Let  us  therefore  give 
indulgence  to  what  is  delightful  to  others,  that  we  may  ask  it  for  what 
is  pleasant  to  ourselves." — [Ep.  rx. :  17  (to  Genitor). 

XII. :  p.  255. — "The  last  days  of  the  Republic  were  marked  by  an 
astonishing  depravity  in  morals ;  the  marriage  of  citizens  had  been 
abandoned,  or  transformed  into  libertinism  through  annual  divorces. 
Cehbacy  was  in  fashion.  Civil  wars  and  proscriptions  had  left  great 
voids  in  families ;  and  under  an  inundation  of  slaves,  of  freedmen  or 
of  foreigners,  the  race  of  citizens  was  disappearing.  Augustus  tried  to 
remedy,  by  laws  and  fiscal  measures,  the  corruption  of  morals  and  the 
exhaustion  of  the  legitimate  population.  .  .  The  leges  Julia  et  Papia 
Poppaea  were  combined  in  such  a  manner  as  to  grant  rewards  of  va- 
rious kinds  to  those  who  were  married  and  fathers,  and  to  punish  with 
various  disabilities  those  who  had  no  children,  and  more  severely  still 
unmarried  pereons.  The  most  vulnerable  point,  and  that  on  which  the 
legislation  struck  with  greatest  effect,  was  the  right  of  profiting  from 
testamentary  provisions.  .  .  The  unmarried  person  could  not  take  any 
part  of  what  had  been  left  him ;  the  orbus  [married,  without  children] 
could  only  take  one-half." — [Ortolan:  "Hist,  of  Roman  Law";  Lon 
doned.,  1871    pp.  308-311. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  5^1 

XIII. :  p.  255. — "  Does  any  woman  now  blush  on  account  of  a  di- 
vorce, since  the  time  when  certain  distin^ished  women,  of  noble  fami- 
lies, reckon  their  years  not  by  the  number  of  the  [annual]  consuls,  but  by 
that  of  their  husbands  ?  and  go  forth  [from  their  husbands]  for  the  sake 
of  being  married,  are  married  for  the  sake  of  being  divorced  ?  .  ,  Is 
there  now  any  shame  at  adultery,  since  it  has  come  to  this,  that  no 
woman  takes  a  husband  except  that  she  may  excite  the  passion  of  a 
paramour?  Modesty  is  a  demonstration  of  deformity.  Where  can 
you  find  any  woman  so  miserable,  so  squalid,  that  one  pair  of  adulter- 
ers is  enough  for  her  ? " — [Seneca :  De  Benef . ;  in. :  16. 

XIV. :  p.  255. — ''She  leaves  the  doors  lately  adorned,  the  tapestries 
still  hanging  on  the  house,  and  the  branches  yet  green  upon  the  thres- 
hold. So  the  number  increases ;  so  eight  husbands  have  become  hera 
in  five  autumns:  a  worthy  fact  for  the  inscription  on  her  tomb."— 
[Juvenal:  Sat.  VI.:  227-30. 

XV. :  p.  255. — "  It  is  either  less,  or  certainly  not  more  than  the  thit*' 
tieth  day,  oh  Faustinus,  since  the  Julian  law  was  revived  for  popular 
restraint,  and  modesty  was  commanded  to  re-enter  houses ;  and  Thele- 
sina  already  marries  her  tenth  man  !  She  who  marries  so  often,  mar- 
ries not  at  all.  She  is  an  adulteress,  under  a  legal  name.  I  am  less 
offended  by  a  more  undisguised  prostitute." — [Martial:  Epig. :  vi. :  7. 

XVI.:  p.  255. — "Finally — and  this  is  the  climax  of  the  whole  in- 
famy— as  the  husband  gained  the  dowry  when  a  divorce  had  taken 
place  on  account  of  the  misconduct  of  the  wife,  it  came  to  pass  that 
men  wishing  to  make  their  fortunes  took  for  their  wives  unchaste 
women,  provided  they  had  property,  in  order  afterward  to  repudiate 
them  on  the  pretext  of  their  licentiousness.  On  the  other  hand  the 
women,  seeing  that  they  were  protected  neither  by  their  virtue  nor  by 
their  love,  gave  themselves  up  without  restraint  to  the  most  frightful 
misconduct ;  and  here  is  another  proof  of  the  truth  which  the  experi- 
ence of  all  time  attests,  that  an  excessive  liberty  of  divorce  leads  woman 
on  to  adultery.  .  .  Adultery  seemed  no  more  an  offence  since  Clodius 
had  made  it  serve  his  interests  in  purging  him  from  his  adulterous  vio- 
lation of  sacred  things." — [Troplong:  "De  I'lnfluence  du  Christian- 
isme";  Paris  ed.,  1868:  pp.  210-11. 

The  same  sort  of  marriage  had  occurred,  according  to  Plutarch,  in 
the  sixth  consulship  of  Marius :  and  to  his  decision  in  favor  of  the  wife 
was  due  her  subsequent  protection  of  him. — ["Lives":  Boston  ed., 
1859:  Vol.  III.:  pp.  91-2. 

X  Vn. :  p.  256. — Strabo  mentions  this  action  of  Cato  without  censure 


572  APPENDIX. 

or  surprise,  simply  referring  to  it  as  "  according  to  an  ancient  custom 
of  the  Romans."— [XI. :  ix. :  (Oxford  ed.,  1806;  Tom.  ll. :  p.  749). 

Augustus,  as  Octavius  Caesar,  had  similarly  taken  his  wife  from  Ti' 
berius  Nero, — ^the  lady  afterward  known  as  Julia  Augusta,  of  whoni 
Tacitus  speaks  almost  with  enthusiasm. — [Annal.  V. :  1. 

Seneca  speaks  of  Maecenas  as  having  married  his  one  wife  a  thousand 
times  ;  [qui  uxorem  millies  duxit,  quum  unam  habuerit.] — [Ep. 
cxiv. :  7. 

This  was,  however,  because  the  wife,  Terentia,  kept  him  in  incessant 
anxiety  by  her  threats  to  divorce  him,  she  being  rich. — [De  Provid. 
m.:  9. 

XVIII. :  p.  256. — "  The  same  year  [of  the  death  of  Germanicus]  the 
licentiousness  of  women  was  restrained  by  severe  decrees  of  the 
Senate,  and  it  was  provided  "  that  no  woman  should  make  merchandise 
of  her  body,  whose  grandfather,  father,  or  husband,  had  been  a  Roman 
knight.  For  Vistilia,  a  lady  bom  of  a  praetorian  family,  had  openly 
published  before  the  jEdiles  the  utter  dissoluteness  of  her  unchastity; 
according  to  a  custom  which  prevailed  among  our  ancestors,  who 
thought  that  a  suflBcient  punishment  of  prostitutes  lay  in  their  simple 
avowal  of  their  infamy." — [Tacitus:  Annal. :  II. :  85. 

XIX. :  p.  256. — "Where  are  adulteries  better  arranged  by  the  priests 
than  among  the  very  altars  and  shrines  ?  Where  are  more  panderings 
debated,  or  more  acts  of  violence  concerted  ?  Fmally,  burning  lust  is 
more  frequently  gratified  in  the  little  chambers  of  the  keepers  of  the 
temples  than  in  the  brothels  themselves." — [Minucius  Felix :  "Octav- 
ius"; XXV. 

The  testimony  of  Tertullian  to  the  same  fact  has  been  cited  already: 
Lecture  II. :  note  XII. 

Ovid  refei's  to  the  same  thing,  in  connection  with  the  temples :  Ars 
Amator.  I. :  77-88;  ill.:  393-4. 

XX. :  p.  256. — The  well-known  passage  in  Terence,  illustrating  the 
depraving  influence  of  the  alleged  example  of  the  Gods,  occurs  in  the 
"Eunuchus,"  Act.  III.:  Sc.  VI. :  580-605. 

Seneca  sharply  remarks  upon  the  same  influence  of  stories  circulated 
in  regard  to  the  divinities :  Vit.  Brev.  xvi. 

The  testimony  of  Aristophanes,  to  the  same  effect,  in  his  earlier  day, 
has  been  cited  already:  Lecture  11. :  note  XII. 

"  When  Timotheus  the  musician  was  one  day  singing  at  Athens  a 
hymn  to  Diana  .  .  Cinesias,  the  lyric  poet,  stood  up  from  the  midst  of 
the  spectators,  and  spoke  aloud,  '  I  wish  thee  with  all  my  heait  such  a 
goddess  to  thy  daughter,  Timotheus '  ! " — [Plutarch  :  On  Supei-stit.  ■; 
** Morals";  Boston  ed.,  1874:  Vol.  1:  pp.  179-180. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  573 

XXI. :  p.  256. — Not  only  the  intense  and  sorrowful  Tacitus,  writing 
m  sentences  that  almost  blister  the  parchment,  but  the  luxurious  and 
libertine  Sallust,  whose  elegant  paragraphs  seem  commonly  carelesa 
of  moral  distinctions,  depicts,  as  with  a  pen  startled  into  indignation, 
the  general  depravation  of  the  last  years  of  the  Republic: — 

"But  the  lust  of  licentiousness,  of  low  debauchery,  and  of  every  sort 
of  luxury,  did  not  the  less  spread  abroad ;  men  let  themselves  be  used  as 
women,  women  publicly  offered  their  chastity  for  sale ;  for  the  sake  of 
filling  themselves  with  food  they  sought  all  things,  by  land  and  sea ; 
they  slept,  before  any  desire  for  sleep  had  come ;  they  waited  neither 
for  hunger,  thirst,  desire  of  coolness,  or  for  weariness,  but  anticipated 
all  in  their  luxurious  indulgence.  These  things  inflamed  the  young, 
when  their  own  properties  had  been  wasted,  to  all  sorts  of  crimes.  The 
spirit  steeped  in  evil  arts  did  not*  easily  restrain  itself  from  any  lusts ; 
it  was  only  more  prodigally  devoted,  in  all  ways,  to  venal  advantage 
and  to  extravagance." — ["  Catalina  " :  xili. 

Seneca's  testimony  is  terrific: — "Dost  thou  believe  any  age  to  have 
been  more  corrupt  in  its  morals  than  that  [of  Clodius],  in  which  lust 
could  not  be  restrained,  either  by  sacred  things  or  by  judicial  proced- 
ures ?  in  which,  in  the  very  inquiry  instituted  by  the  Senate,  in  an  ex- 
traordinary exercise  of  its  power,  greater  villainy  was  committed  than 
that  which  was  the  object  of  the  inquiry  ?  It  was  questioned  whether, 
after  an  adultery,  a  man  could  remain  secure:  it  appeared  that  he 
could  not  be  secure  except  through  adultery.  .  .  Do  not  believe,  then, 
that  only  in  our  own  time  is  it  true  that  the  largest  prerogative  is  al- 
lowed to  licentiousness,  and  the  least  to  the  laws." — [Seneca  :  Ep. 
xcvii. :  7,  8. 

"However  monstrous  the  crimes  into  which  ecclesiastical  passions 
betray  men,  they  are,  after  all,  less  revolting  than  the  loathsome 
atrocities  of  periods  lost  to  all  restraints  of  reverence;  and  even  the 
Papacy  of  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries  appears  innocent,  in 
comparison  with  the  government  of  Asia  and  Greece  under  Alexan- 
der's successors,  and  of  the  Empire  during  the  decline  of  Rorae." — 
[James  Martineau  :  "Miscellanies";  Boston  ed.,  1852  :  p.  377. 

Merivale  says,  not  extravagantly,  in  regard  to  the  story  of  Messalina : 
— "We  seem,  indeed,  in  perusing  the  narrative  before  us,  to  be  wel- 
tering in  a  dream  of  horrors,  which,  nevertheless,  exert  over  us  a  kind 
of  fascination,  and  however  we  may  pause  at  intervals  to  question  the 
phantasms  they  present  to  us,  forbid  us  to  shake  off  our  constrained 
assent  to  their  reality. "^[" Hist,  of  Romans";  London  ed.,  1856: 
Vol.  V. :  p.  537. 

XXII. :  p.  256. — The  obelisk  on  the  Monte  Pincio,  at  Rome,  in  the 
public  promenade,  is  found,  from  the  hieroglyphics  upon  it,  to  have 


5Y4  APPENDIX. 

been  erected  in  honor  of  Antinous,  in  the  names  of  Hadrian  and  Sabina 
—[See  "Handbook  of  Rome";  London  ed.,  1873  :  p.  93. 

XXni.  :  p.  257. — "The  Tricliniarch  and  his  subordinates  were 
equally  occupied  in  the  larger  saloons :  where  stood  the  costly  tables 
of  cedar-wood,  with  pillars  of  ivory  supporting  their  massive  orbs, 
which  had,  at  an  immense  expense,  been  conveyed  to  Rome  from  the 
primeval  woods  of  Atlas.  In  one,  the  wood  was  like  the  beautifully 
dappled  coat  of  a  panther;  in  another,  the  spots,  being  more  regular 
and  close,  imitated  the  tail  of  the  peacock ;  a  third  resembled  the  luxu- 
riant and  tangled  leaves  of  the  apium  ; — each  of  them  more  beautiful 
and  valuable  than  the  other;  and  many  a  lover  of  splendour  would 
have  bartered  an  estate  for  any  one  of  the  three.  .  .  Next  came  the 
side-boards,  several  of  which  stood  against  the  walls  in  each  saloon,  for 
the  purpose  of  displaying  the  gold  and  silver  plate  and  other  valuables. 
Some  of  them  were  slabs  of  marble,  supported  by  silver  or  gilded  ram's 
feet,  or  by  the  tips  of  the  wings  of  two  griffins  looking  in  opposite 
directions.  There  was  also  one  of  artificial  marble,  which  had  been 
sawn  out  of  the  wall  of  a  Grecian  temple,  while  the  slabs  of  the  rest 
were  of  precious  metal.  The  costly  articles  displayed  on  each  were  so 
selected  as  to  be  in  keeping  with  the  architectural  designs  of  the  apart- 
ment. .  .  In  the  Corinthian  saloon  stood  vessels  of  precious  Corinthian 
bronze,  whose  worn  handles  and  peculiar  smell  sufficiently  announced 
their  antiquity,  together  with  two  large  golden  drinking  cups,  on  one 
of  which  were  engraved  scenes  from  the  Iliad,  on  the  other  from  the 
Odyssey.  Besides  these  there  were  smaller  beakers  and  bowls  composed 
of  precious  stones,  either  made  of  one  piece  only,  and  adorned  mth 
reliefs,  or  of  several  cameos  united  by  settings  of  gold.  Genuine 
Murrhina  vases  also, — even  at  that  time  a  riddle,  and  according  to 
report  imported  from  the  recesses  of  Parthia, — ^were  not  wanting. 

"  The  Egyptian  saloon,  however,  surpassed  the  rest  in  magnificence. 
Every  silver  or  golden  vessel  which  it  contained  was  made  by  the  most 
celebrated  toreutce,  and  possessed  a  higher  value  from  the  beauty  of  its 
workmanship  than  even  from  the  costliness  of  its  material.  .  .  No  less 
worthy  of  admiration  were  the  ingenious  works  in  glass,  from  Alexan- 
dria ;  beakers  and  saucers  of  superb  moulding,  and  imitating  so  natu- 
rally the  tints  of  the  amethyst  and  ruby,  as  completely  to  deceive  the 
beholder;  othei's  shone  like  onyxes,  and  were  cut  in  relief;  but  supe- 
rior to  all  were  some  of  the  purest  crystal,  and  uncoloured.  Still  there 
was  one  object  which,  on  account  of  its  ingenious  construction,  at- 
tracted more  than  any  thing  else  the  eyes  of  all  spectators.  This  was  a 
bowl  of  the  colour  of  opal,  surrounded  at  the  distance  of  a  fourth  part 
of  an  inch  by  an  azure  network,  carved  out  of  the  same  piece  as  the 
vessel,  and  only  connected  with  it  by  a  few  fine  slips  that  had  been  left. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  675 

bcinjath  the  edge  of  the  cup  was  written  the  following  inscription :  the 
letters  were  green,  and  projected  in  a  similar  manner,  supported  only 
by  some  delicate  props  :  Bibe,  vivas  multis  annis.^^ — [Becker  :  "Gal 
lus";  London  ed.,  1866  :  pp.  16-20. 

XXIV. :  p.  257. — "  The  orator  Calvus  bewailed  the  fact  that  kitchen 
utensils  were  made  of  silver ;  but  we  have  invented  a  plan  for  cover- 
ing our  carriages  with  engraved  silver-work ;  and  in  our  own  time  Pop- 
psea,  wife  of  Nero  the  emperor,  was  accustomed  to  have  her  daintier 
mules  shod  with  gold."— [Pliny:  Hist.  Nat. :  xxxiii. :  49. 

"  The  milk  of  the  ass  is  supposed  to  add  a  certain  shining  whiteness 
to  the  skin  of  women.  Certainly  Poppaea,  the  wife  of  Domitius  Nero, 
taking  about  with  her  everywhere  five  hundred  asses  with  foal,  was 
accustomed  to  soften  her  whole  body  in  their  milk  in  the  bath-tub,  be- 
lieving also  that  thus  the  skin  was  made  smooth." — [Pliny:  Hist.  Nat. : 
XI.:  96. 

XXV, :  p.  257. — "  In  like  manner  we  are  commanded  to  love  no  Im 
modesty.  By  this  means,  therefore,  we  are  cut  off  from  the  theatre 
likewise,  which  is  the  private  council-chamber  of  immodesty,  wherein 
nothing  is  approved  save  that  which  is  elsewhere  disapproved.  Where- 
fore its  chief  grace  is  for  the  most  part  fijiely  framed  out  of  filthy  lewd- 
ness, such  as  the  Atellan  acteth,  such  as  the  buffoon  representeth  even 
under  the  character  of  women,  banishing  their  distinctive  modesty,  so 
that  they  may  blush  at  home  more  easily  than  in  the  theatre ;  such  as, 
finally,  the  pantomime  submitteth  to  in  his  own  body  from  his  child 
'aood,  that  he  may  be  able  to  be  an  actor.  The  very  harlots  also,  the 
victims  of  the  pubhc  lust,  are  brought  forward  on  the  stage  .  .  and 
are  bandied  about  by  the  mouths  of  every  age  and  rank ;  their  abode, 
their  price,  their  description,  even  in  matters  of  which  it  is  not  good  to 
speak,  are  proclaimed.  I  pass  over  the  rest  in  silence :  which  indeed  it 
were  fitting  should  remain  hid  in  its  own  darkness  and  dens,  lest  it 
pollute  the  day."— [TertuUian:  DeSpectac:  xvii. 

' '  The  ballet-dancers  were  quite  a  match  for  those  of  the  present  day 
in  the  variety  of  their  pursuits,  and  the  skill  with  which  they  followed 
them ;  their  prima-donnas,  Cytheris  and  the  like,  pollute  even  the  pages 
of  history.  But  their  as  it  were  licensed  trade,  was  very  materially 
injured  by  the  free  art  of  the  ladies  of  aristocratic  circles.  Liaisons  in 
Die  first  houses  had  become  so  frequent  that  only  a  scandal  altogether 
exceptional  could  make  them  the  subject  of  special  talk;  a  judicial  in- 
teiference  seemed  now  almost  ridiculous.  .  .  The  plot  [of  the  new 
Mimus]  was  of  course  still  more  indifferent,  loose,  and  absurd  than  in 
the  harlequinade.  .  .  The  subjects  were  chiefly  of  an  amorous  nature, 
mostly  of  the  licentious  sort;  for  example,  poet  and  pubhc,  without 


576  APPENDIX. 

exception,  took  part  against  the  husband,  and  poetical  justice  consistetl 
in  the  derision  of  good  morals." — [Mommsen:  "Hist,  of  Rome " ;  Lon- 
don ed.,  1868:  Vol.  4:  pp.  547,  613. 

"  There  was  hardly  any  more  lucrative  trade  in  Rome  than  that  ol 
the  actor  and  the  dancmg-girl  of  the  first  rank ;  the  dancer  Dionysia 
estimated  her  income  at  200,000  sesterces  (£2,000).  .  .  It  was  nothing 
unusual  for  the  Roman  dancing-girls  to  throw  off,  at  the  fijiale,  the 
upper  robe,  and  to  give  a  dance  in  undress  for  the  benefit  of  the  pub- 
lic."—[Vol.  4:  pp.  614-5. 

XXVI. :  p.  257. — ^Valerius  Maximus  says  that  'the  first  exhibition  of 
gladiators  was  given  at  Rome  in  the  Forum  Boarium  under  the  con- 
sulship of  Appius  Claudius  and  Marcus  Fulvius  [B.C.  262]:  and  that 
Marcus  and  Decimus  Brutus  gave  it,  in  memory  of  their  dead  Father, 
and  by  way  of  honoring  his  funeral  ceremonies.  A  combat  of  athletes 
was  likewise  presented  by  the  munificence  of  Marcus  Scaurus.' — [II.  j 
IV.:  7. 

The  same  statement  appears,  in  substance,  in  the  epitome  of  the 
XVI  th  Book  of  Livy. 

XXVII.  :  p.  258.— "Caesar,  in  his  JEdileship,  at  the  outset  of  his 
political  career,  undertook  to  present  such  a  mass  of  combatants  that 
the  frightened  Senate  interposed  objection;  he  had  to  confine  himself 
to  320  couples.  But  when  nothing  longer  hindered  him,  in  his  final 
triumph,  not  only  the  customary  combats  were  presented,  but  a  com- 
plete image  of  war,  a  sea-fight  and  a  battle,  a  mixed  conflict  of  men, 
horses,  and  elephants.  Everywhere  amphitheatres  were  erected,  and 
their  ruins  rise  still,  from  one  end  to  the  other  of  Roman  Gaul,  from 
Nismes  to  Treves,  memorials  of  the  civilization  which  Rome  carried 
thither.  .  .  Augustus,  after  having  imitated  the  extravagance  of  Coesar 
when  he  had  power  to  gain,  seems  to  have  returned  to  better  sentiments 
when  he  had  power  to  exercise.  But  the  restraint  which  he  imposed 
upon  others  he  scarcely  regarded  for  himself.  The  monument  of  An- 
cyra  states  that  he  had  made  to  fight,  either  in  his  own  name  or  in  the 
name  of  his  children,  about  ten  thousand  men.  .  .  The  Flavians  built 
the  Coliseum.  Vespasian  began  it,  Titus  inaugurated  it,  with  a  fete  of 
a  hundred  days.  Under  Domitian  the  days  were  not  long  enough  for 
the  combatants ;  they  fought  at  night,  by  the  light  of  torches.  Trajan, 
whose  memory  is  so  dear  to  humanity,  flung  into  the  arena,  at  a  single 
festival,  ten  thousand  captives.  This  was  on  his  return  from  the  Da- 
cian  War ;  the  games  lasted  a  hundred  and  twenty-three  days.  Com- 
modus  gave  more  than  a  thousand  combats  of  gladiators ;  one  counts 
still  eight  hundred  pairs  of  gladiators  at  the  triumph  of  Aurelian ;  six 
hundred  at  the  fetes  of  Gallienus,  and  three  hundred  at  the  triumph  of 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIIl.  577 

.Probiis.  .  .  The  double  influence,  of  ambition  under  the  repubUc,  and 
of  power  under  the  empire,  the  imperious  eagerness  of  the  populace 
which,  whether  master  or  slave,  was  determined  to  be  amused  with 
these  murderous  spectacles,  concurred  in  keeping  the  class  of  gladi- 
ators always  large  in  point  of  numbers.  .  .  A  fete  was  finally  not 
complete  unless  it  embraced  combats  of  men  with  beasts ;  combats  of 
bulls,  of  lions,  of  bears,  or  of  panthers.  Many,  doubtless  of  those  con- 
demned  for  crime,  were  delivered  naked  to  the  beasts.  They  called  it 
'  a  chase ' ;  but  in  such  conditions  the  beast  was  less  often  the  prey  of 
the  hunter  than  the  hunter  of  the  beast." — [Wall on:  "  Histou-e  de 
I'Esclavage";  Paris  ed.,  1879:  Tom.  11. :  pp.  137-139. 

XXVIII. :  p.  258. — Merivale  sums  up  briefly  the  facts  of  construc- 
tion in  the  Colosseum,  and  of  its  dedication,  as  follows: — "  The  height 
of  this  celebrated  structure,  the  cornice  of  which  is  still  presei^v^ed 
throughout  one-thu'd  of  its  circuit,  is  said  to  be  160  feet ;  the  major 
axis  of  its  elliptical  circumference  measures  615,  the  minor  510  feet, 
while  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  arena  itself  are  respectively  281  and 
176  feet.  Rows  of  seats  rise  concentrically  to  the  level  of  the  upper 
story,  the  lowest  row,  or  podium,  being  assigned  to  the  senators,  the 
vestals,  and  the  emperor  with  his  personal  attendants.  Eighty-seven 
thousand  spectators  were  accommodated  within  the  walls.  The  build  ■ 
ing  was  of  the  rich  and  warm  travertine  stone,  or  encrusted  with  mar- 
ble; the  most  conspicuous  parts  shone  with  precious  gems  and  metals 
a  gilded  network  protected  the  sitters  in  the  lowest  rows  from  the 
chance  assaults  of  the  animals  beneath  them.  .  .  The  name  of  Colos- 
seum popularly  attached  to  it,  and  improperly  written  Coliseum,  first 
occurs  in  the  works  of  our  countryman  Bede,  in  the  seventh  century. 

.  The  dedication  gave  room  for  the  display  of  pious  magnificence  od 
a  scale  hitherto  unrivaled.  A  battle  of  cranes  with  dwarfs  was  a  fan 
cif ul  novelty,  and  might  afford  diversion  for  a  moment ;  there  were 
combats  of  gladiators,  among  whom  women  were  included,  though  no 
noble  matron  was  allowed  to  mingle  in  the  fray ;  the  capacity  of  the 
vast  edifice  was  tested  by  the  slaughter  of  five  thousand  animals  within 
its  circuit.  The  show  was  crowned  with  the  immission  of  water  into 
the  arena,  and  with  a  sea-fight." — ["Hist,  of  the  Romans";  London 
ed.,  1862:  Vol.  VII. :  pp.  40-41,  55. 

XXIX. :  p.  258. — "The  Circus  was  fitted  for  containing  a  vast  num- 
ber of  people.  Dionysius  of  Halicamassus  says  150,000;  Pliny,  260,- 
000  ;  Victor,  380,000  ;  the  modem  Victor,  385,000  ;  and  thg  Notitia 
Imperii,  405,000." 

Gibbon  estimates  150,000  as  the  probable  number  to  be  accommoda- 
ted, though  he  admits  that  Pliny's  statement  can  hardly  be  that  of  one 
who  was  deceived.— [Misc.  Works ;  London  ed.,  1796 :  Vol.  2 :  pp.  145-9 
37 


o7S  APPENDIX. 

XXX. :  p.  259.—"  We  have  seen  in  our  day  a  representation  of  tli€ 
mutilation  of  Attis,  that  famous  god  of  Pessinus,  and  a  man  burnt  alive 
as  Hercules.  We  have  made  meriy  amid  the  ludicrous  cruelties  of  the 
noon-day  exhibition,  at  Mercmy  examining  the  bodies  of  the  dead  witli 
his  hot  iron ;  we  have  witnessed  Jove's  brother  [Pluto],  mallet  in  hand^ 
di-agging  out  the  corpses  of  the  gladiators." — [Tertullian  :  Apol. :  15. 

For  the  exposure  of  Laureolus,  under  Domitian,  'on  no  fictitious 
cross,'  to  a  Caledonian  bear,  see  Martial,  de  Spectac.  vii, ;  on  Scaevola, 
with  'his  hand  reigning  in  the  astonished  flame,'  Epig.  Vlll. :  30;  Ott 
Mucius,  criticised  for  preferring  to  sacrifice  his  hand  in  the  fu*e  rather 
than  be  enveloped  in  the  blazing  tunic,  Epig.  x. :  25. 

' '  Then  they  being  fu'st  seized  who  confessed  [to  being  Christians], 
and  afterward  on  their  information  a  great  multitude,  were  convicted 
not  so  much  of  the  crime  of  burning  the  city,  as  of  enmity  toward  the 
human  race.  Mockeries  also  were  added  to  their  deaths,  as  they,  clothed 
in  skins  of  wild  beasts,  died  under  the  laceration  of  dogs,  or  were  sus- 
pended on  crosses,  or  were  set  on  fii*e  and  burned  as  the  day  descended, 
for  the  purpose  of  nocturnal  illumination.  Nero  offered  his  own  gar- 
dens for  the  spectacle." — [Tacitus  :  Annal. :  XV. :  44. 

Plutarch  takes  an  image  from  the  burning  of  men,  in  the  theatre,  to 
illustrate  the  folly  of  supposing  wicked  men  happy  and  safe  because 
they  live  in  splendid  circumstances : — "  There  are  some  people  that  dif- 
fer little  or  nothing  from  children,  who,  many  times  beholding  male- 
factors on  the  stage,  in  their  gilded  vestments  and  short  purple  cloaks, 
dancing  with  crowns  upon  their  heads,  admire  and  look  upon  them  as 
the  most  happy  persons  in  the  world,  till  they  see  them  gored  and 
lashed,  and  flames  of  fire  curling  from  beneath  their  sumptuous  and 
gaudy  gai-ments."— ["Morals";  Boston  ed.,  1874  :  Vol.  IV. :  p.  154. 

XXXI. :  p.  259. — "They  [the  spectacles]  filled  the  atmosphere  of  in- 
tellectual life  at  Rome  with  a  contagion  the  influences  of  which  all  the 
advantages  of  high  mental  cultivation,  and  of  an  elevated  social  condi- 
tion, were  powerless  to  neutralize,  and  to  which  the  delicate  sex  was 
only  too  accessible.  One  inhaled  the  passionate  enthusiasm  for  the  games 
of  the  circus,  of  the  theatre  and  the  arena,  with  the  very  air  in  which  one 
lived;  it  was  one  of  those  diseases  peculiar  to  the  great  city,  the  ele- 
ment of  which  was  already  inoculated  in  the  infant,  if  one  may  so  say, 
in  its  mother's  womb.  But  how  pernicious  were  the  general  effects 
which  must  be  attributed  to  the  influence  of  these  spectacles  on  the 
morality  of  the  higher  classes,  it  is  almost  impossible  to  specify  in  par- 
ticulars. .  .  The  active  part  which  the  emperors  took  in  the  represen- 
tations superabundantly  proves  that  there  was,  even  in  the  highest  cii*- 
i'les  of  society,  a  passion  for  these  games  which  degenerated  into  a 
veritable  mania,  which  could  be  arrested  by  none  of  the  barriers  which 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIIL  579 

ancient  customs  and  laws  interposed,"— [Friedlaender  :    "Moeurs  Ro- 
niaiiies";  Paris  ed.,  1867  :  Tom.  II. :  pp.  37,  38. 

XXXII.:  p.  259. — "Claudius  armed  three-banked  and  four-banked 
galleys,  with  nineteen  thousand  men,  the  edge  of  the  lake  being  girdled 
with  rafts,  that  there  might  be  no  facility  of  escape,  and  still  embracing 
space  enough  for  energy  in  rowing,  for  skill  on  the  part  of  pilots,  for 
the  onset  of  ships,  and  for  all  the  customary  incidents  of  battle.  On 
the  rafts  were  stationed  companies  of  infantry  and  squadrons  of  caval- 
ly,  of  the  praetorian  cohorts,  with  bulwarks  in  front,  from  which  cata- 
pults and  balistas  might  be  directed.  Marine  forces  occupied  the  rest 
of  the  lake,  with  decked  ships.  As  in  a  theatre,  an  innumerable  mul- 
titude from  neighbouring  towns  as  well  as  from  the  city,  covered  banks 
and  hills,  and  the  heights  of  mountains,  in  their  eagerness  to  see  or  in 
honor  to  the  emperor.  He  presided,  in  splendid  military  dress,  Agi'ip- 
pina  not  far  from  him  in  a  gold- wrought  mantle  of  state.  The  battle, 
though  between  criminals,  was  fought  with  the  spirit  of  brave  men ; 
and  after  much  bloodshed,  they  were  excused  from  proceeding  to  com- 
plete massacre." — [Tacitus  :  Annal. :  xii. :  56. 

XXXIII.:  p.  260. — "Now  for  a  long  time  the  Syrian  Orontes  has 
flowed  into  the  Tiber,  and  has  borne  upon  it  its  language,  and  morals, 
and  the  slanting  harp-strings,  with  the  flute-player,  and  the  foreign 
tambourines,  and  girls  required  to  stand  for  prostitution  at  the  Circus. 
Go  there !  any  to  whom  a  barbarian  harlot,  with  ornamented  turban,  is 
attractive."— [Juvenal :  Sat.  m. :  62-66. 

' '  We  suffer  in  our  times  the  evils  of  long  peace ;  luxury,  more  ruth- 
less than  war,  has  laid  itself  upon  us,  and  avenges  a  conquered  world. 
No  crime  is  wanting,  no  deed  of  lust,  since  Roman  poverty  passed 
away.  Hence,  Sybaris  has  flowed  to  these  hills,  and  Rhodes,  and 
Miletus,  and  intoxicated  Tarentum,  garlanded  and  insolent." — [Sat. 
VI. :  292-297. 

Gibbon  criticises  Juvenal,  as  possessing  justness  of  understanding  and 
honesty  of  heart,  but  being  deficient  in  point  of  sweetness  and  sensi- 
bility, and  as  not  allowing  himseK  to  bestow  praise  on  virtuous  char- 
acters of  his  own  time,  even  with  the  view  of  rendering  the  vicious 
more  ugly  by  the  contrast.  But  he  says,  himself: — "I  know  that 
there  never,  perhaps,  was  an  age  more  profligate  than  that  of  Juvenal ; 
in  which  morals  were  enervated  by  luxury ;  the  heart  hardened  by  the 
institutions  of  domestic  slavery  and  the  amphitheatre ;  sentiments  de- 
based by  the  tyranny  of  government;  and  every  characteristic  and 
manly  principle  subverted,  by  the  mixture  and  confusion  of  nations  in 
one  great  city. "—[Misc.  Works;  London,  1796:  Vol.  2:  pp.  100,  108. 


580  APPENDIJ^. 

XXXIV. :  p.  260. — Canon  Rawlinson,  in  a  striking  passage,  traces 
the  frightful  viciousness  of  the  early  imperial  period  to  this  want  of 
any  clear  expectation  of  future  life : — 

"Men  generally  looked  to  this  life  as  alone  worthy  of  their  concern 
or  care,  and  did  not  deem  it  necessary  to  provide  for  a  future  the  com- 
ing of  which  was  so  uncertain.  All  thought  was  concentrated  on  the 
modes  of  attaining  m  this  world  the  utmost  possible  enjoyment,  the  in- 
finite capacity  of  man  for  enjoyment  vainly  seeking  to  obtain  satisfac- 
tion within  the  narrow  term  of  a  human  lifetime.  .  .  Death,  ever 
drawing  nearer,  ever  snatching  away. the  precious  moments  of  life, 
leaving  men's  store  perpetually  less  and  less,  and  sure  to  come  at  last 
and  claim  them  bodily  for  his  victims,  made  life,  except  in  the  mo- 
ments of  high-wrought  excitement,  a  continual  misery.  Hence  the  great- 
ness and  intensity  of  the  heathen  vices ;  hence  the  enormous  ambition, 
the  fierce  vengeance,  the  extreme  luxury,  the  strange  shapes  of  profli- 
gacy ;  hence  the  madness  of  their  revels,  the  savageness  of  their  sports, 
the  perfection  of  their  sensualism ;  hence  Apician  feasts,  and  Capuan 
retirements,  and  Neronic  cruelties,  and  Vitellian  gormandism  ;  they 
before  whose  eyes  the  pale  spectre  ever  stood,  waving  them  onward 
with  his  skeleton  hand  to  the  black  gulf  of  aimihilation,  fled  to  these 
and  similar  excesses  to  escape,  if  it  might  be,  for  a  few  short  hours  the 
thought  which  haunted  them,  the  terror  which  dogged  their  steps.  In 
the  wild  carelessness  of  the  Anacreontic  drinking-song,  in  the  mad 
license  of  comedy,  .  .  we  see  the  efi'orts  made  to  shut  out  for  a  while 
the  sense  of  the  Awful  Presence,  and  to  divert  the  soul  from  brooding 
on  a  woe  felt  to  be  intolerable." — ["University  Sermons";  London 
ed.,  1861  :  pp.  40,  41. 

XXXV. :  p.  261. — In  justice  to  Seneca,  some  of  his  words  on  this 
matter  should  be  quoted,  and  not  merely  referred  to : — 

"Nothing  is  so  destructive  to  good  morals  as  to  sit  long  in  one  of 
these  spectacles;  then  most  easily  vices  steal  upon  one  through  the 
pleasure  which  he  feels.  I  return  more  greedy,  ambitious,  luxurious, 
yes,  more  cruel  and  inhuman,  because  I  have  been  among  such  men. 
By  chance  I  happened  upon  the  noon-day  shows,  expecting  sports,  and 
jests,  and  something  of  relaxation,  by  which  men's  eyes  might  be 
rested  from  the  sight  of  human  blood.  On  the  contrary,  whatever  had 
before  been  fought  had  been  matter  of  mercy ;  now,  all  trifles  omit- 
ted, there  are  simple  murders ;  combatants  have  nothing  to  cover  them ; 
exposed  in  their  whole  bodies  to  the  stroke,  they  never  strike  in  vain. 
.  .  In  the  morning,  men  are  exposed  to  lions  and  bears,  at  noon  to 
their  own  spectatoi-s.  Those  who  kill  are  commanded  to  be  set  against 
those  who  ai*e  to  kill ;  and  they  keep  him  who  is  conqueror  for  another 
fllaiighter.     The  end  of  those  fighting  is  death ;  by  sword  and  fire  the 


JVOT^S  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  581 

thing  IS  completed.  .  .  *  The  spectacle  is  intermitted ;  in  the  meantime 
men  have  theii  throats  cut,  lest  nothing  should  be  done.'  Come  now  I 
Do  you  not  understand  that  such  evil  examples  as  these  run  back 
upon  those  who  do  such  things  ? " — [Epist.  vil. :  2,  5. 

It  can  hardly  be  denied,  however,  that  there  is  an  important  element 
of  truth  in  the  scornful  words  in  which  Macaulay  has  satirized  Seneca: 

"It  is  very  reluctantly  that  Seneca  can  be  brought  to  confess  that 
any  philosopher  had  ever  paid  the  smallest  attention  to  anything  that 
could  possibly  promote  what  vulgar  people  would  consider  as  the  well- 
being  of  mankind.  .  .  No,  to  be  sure.  The  business  of  a  philosopher 
was  to  declaim  in  praise  of  poverty  with  two  millions  sterling  out  at 
usury,  to  meditate  epigrammatic  conceits  about  the  evils  of  luxury,  in 
gardens  which  moved  the  envy  of  sovereigns,  to  rant  about  liberty, 
while  fawning  on  the  insolent  and  pampered  freedmen  of  a  tyrant,  to 
celebrate  the  divine  beauty  of  virtue  with  the  same  pen  which  had  just 
before  written  a  defence  of  the  murder  of  a  mother  by  a  son." — [Essay 
on  Bacon;  "Works":  London  ed.,  1873:  Vol.  VI:  pp.  205-6. 

XXXVI.:  p.  261. — "He  [Nero]  planned  a  new  fashion  of  city 
houses,  and  that  there  should  be  piazzas  before  blocks  and  dwellings, 
from  the  balconies  of  which  fires  might  be  ari'ested ;  and  he  constructed 
these  at  his  own  expense.  He  had  it  in  contemplation  to  extend  the 
walls  as  far  as  to  Ostia,  and  thence  to  bring  the  sea  into  the  old  part  of 
the  city  by  a  canal.  A  limit  was  set  to  extravagant  expenses ;  public 
suppers  were  restricted  to  the  distribution  of  food  in  baskets;  the 
Christians  were  smitten  down  with  tortures — a  class  of  men  holding  a 
recent  and  mischievous  superstition ;  the  revels  of  the  charioteers  were 
forbidden;  and  the  factious  partisans  of  the  ballet-dancers  were  exiled, 
with  themselves. " — [Suetonius :  ' '  Nero  " ;  xvi. 

XXXVII.:  p.  261. — "The  circus  supplies  these  opportunities  to  a 
fresh  love,  and  the  sand  sprinkled  in  the  agitated  forum  for  the  sad 
offices.  On  that  sand  often  has  the  son  of  Venus  fought;  and  he  who 
has  been  looking  upon  wounds  receives  a  wound.  While  he  talks,  and 
touches  her  hand,  and  asks  for  the  programme  of  races,  and  inquires 
which  has  conquered,  having  given  his  pledge  for  the  bet,  wounded 
he  sighs,  and  becomes  himself  part  of  the  spectacle  on  which  he  came^ 
to  look. "—[Ovid:  Ars  Amator. ;  I.  163-170. 

More  particular  directions  are  given,  138-163 ;  and  are  dwelt  upon  in 
Amor.  HI. :  el.  ii. 

XXXVin. :  p.  261. — "  But  however  these  things  and  the  like  may 
attract  attention  or  be  estimated  [traditions  concerning  the  founding^ 
of  the  city],  I  shall  not  consider  of  any  great  moment.    For  myself,  y 


582  APPENDIX. 

would  have  each  man  intently  apply  his  mind  to  these  points:  what 
their  life,  and  what  their  manners  were ;  hy  what  men,  and  tlirough 
what  skillful  endeavors,  hoth  in  peace  and  in  war,  their  empu^e  was  ac- 
quired and  increased.  Then,  as  discipline,  little  by  little,  wasted  away, 
let  him  follow  in  his  mind  their  moral  habits,  at  first  yielding  as  ii 
slightly ;  then,  as  more  and  more  they  sank  away ;  then  as  they  began 
to  fall  precipitately ;  until  he  comes  fairly  to  these  times  of  ours,  in 
which  we  are  neither  able  to  endure  our  vices,  nor  the  remedies  for 
them." — [livy  :  Praef.  Histor. 

XXXIX.:  p.  262. — "I  approach  a  work  opulent  in  calamities, 
gloomy  with  combats,  full  of  discord  through  civil  strifes,  ferocious 
even  in  peace  itself.  .  .  The  city  devastated  with  conflagrations,  in 
which  its  most  ancient  shrines  were  consumed,  and  the  Capitol  was 
itself  burned  by  the  hands  of  citizens ;  religious  rites  polluted ;  multi- 
plied adulteries ;  the  sea  full  of  exiles ;  the  rocks  made  pestilential  by 
slaughter.  In  the  city  a  still  more  cruel  rage.  Nobility,  wealth,  hon- 
ors laid  aside  and  honors  borne,  regarded  as  criminal ;  and  the  surest 
destruction  the  consequence  of  vu*tues." — [Tacitus:  Histor.:  I.:  2. 

XL. :  p.  263.— 

"  On  that  hard  Pagan  world  disgust 
And  secret  loathing  fell : 
Deep  weariness  and  sated  lust 
Made  human  life  a  hell. 

"  In  his  cool  hall,  with  haggard  eyes, 
The  Roman  noble  lay ; 
He  drove  abroad,  in  furious  guise, 
Along  the  Appian  way; 

"  He  made  a  feast,  drank  fierce  and  fast, 
And  crown'd  his  hair  with  flowers- 
No  easier  nor  no  quicker  pass'd 
The  impracticable  hours," 

[Matthew  Arnold:  Poems;  London  ed., 
1869:  Vol.  2:  p.  244. 

XLI. :  p.  264. — "  On  the  same  side  [with  the  Jews]  were  the  Greeks, 
with  their  Chaos  of  Religion,  full  of  mingled  beauty  and  ugliness, 
virtue  and  vice,  piety  and  lust,  still  more  confounded  by  the  deep  mys- 
teries of  the  priest,  the  cunning  speculations  of  the  sophist,  the  awful 
subhmity  of  the  sage,  by  the  sweet  music  of  the  philosopher  and 
moralist  and  poet,  who  spoke  and  sung  of  man  and  God  in  strains  so 
sweet  and  touching ;  there  were  rites  in  public ;  solemn  and  pompous 
ceremonies,  processions,  festivals,  games  to  captivate  that  wondrous 
people ;  there  were  secret  mysteries,  to  charm  the  curious  and  attract 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIIL  583 

tlie  thoughtful;  Greece,  with  her  Arts,  her  Science,  her  Heroes  and 
her  Gods,  her  Muse,  voluptuous  and  sweet. 

"  There  too  was  Rome,  the  Queen  of  nations,  and  Conqueror  of  the 
world,  who  sat  on  her  seven-hilled  throne,  and  cast  her  net  eastward 
and  southward  and  northward  and  westward,  over  tower  and  city  and 
realm  and  empire,  and  drew  them  to  herself,  a  giant's  spoil ;  with  a 
Religion  haughty  and  insolent,  that  looked  down  on  the  divinities  of 
Greece  and  Egypt,  of  '  Ormus  and  the  Ind,'  and  gave  them  a  sheltei 
in  her  capacious  robe ;  Rome,  with  her  practised  skill ;  Rome,  with  her 
eloquence ;  Rome,  with  her  pride ;  Rome,  with  her  arms,  hot  from  the 
conquest  of  a  thousand  kings. 

"  On  the  same  side  are  all  the  institutions  of  all  the  world ;  its  fables, 
wealth,  armies,  pride,  its  folly  and  its  sin.  On  the  other  hand,  are  a 
few  Jewish  fishermen,  untaught,  rude,  and  vulgar ;  not  free  from  gross 
errors ;  despised  at  home,  not  known  abroad ;  collected  together  in  the 
name  of  a  young  carpenter,  who  died  on  the  gallows,  and  whom  they 
declared  to  be  risen  from  the  dead ;  men  with  no  ritual,  no  learning, 
no  books,  no  brass  in  their  purse,  no  philosophy  in  their  mind,  no  elo- 
quence on  their  tongue.  A  Roman  skeptic  might  tell  how  soon  these 
fanatics  would  fall  out,  and  destroy  themselves,  after  serving  as  a  ter- 
ror to  the  maids  and  a  sport  to  the  boys  of  a  Jewish  hamlet,  and  so 
that  'detestable  superstition'  come  to  an  end!" — [Theodore  Parker: 
*'  Discourse  of  Religion  ";  Boston  ed.,  1843:  pp.  310-311. 

XLII. :  p.  264. — "  The  destruction  of  Jerusalem  put  an  end  to  the 
outward  existence  of  the  Jewish  nationality.  The  temple  fell,  the  sac- 
rifices ceased.  .  .  Spread  abroad  over  the  earth,  Judaism  henceforth 
was  united  only  by  the  common  Law,  and  by  the  common  doctrine 
contained  in  the  newly  collected  Talmud.  Thus  it  became  completely 
separated  from  Christianity.  Talmudic  Judaism  severed  all  the  con- 
nections which  had  hitherto  bound  it  to  Christianity.  Henceforth 
three  times  every  day  in  the  synagogues  was  invoked  the  awful  curse 
on  the  renegades,  the  Christians.  .  .  It  was  therefore  no  longer  possi- 
ble to  confound  the  Christians  with  the  Jews.  Henceforth  they  were 
recognized  by  the  heathen  as  a  genus  tertium — a  third  party  beside 
Heathenism  and  Judaism." — [Uhlhorn:  "Conflict  of  Christianity"; 
New  York  ed.,  1879:  pp.  253-4. 

XLIII. :  p.  265. — As  an  example  of  the  forms  of  address,  at  once 
tender  and  austere,  by  Christian  teachers  to  the  higher  social  classes 
at  Rome,  nothing  perhaps  is  better  than  the  following  passage  from 
Jerome,  concluding  his  eulogy  of  Paul,  the  first  Hermit: — 

' '  I  am  inclined,  at  the  end  of  my  treatise,  to  ask  those  who  know 
not  the  extent  of  their  patrimonies,  who  cover  their  houses  with  mar 


584  APPENDIX. 

bles,  who  sew  the  price  of  whole  farms  into  their  garments  with  a^ 
single  thread,  What  was  ever  wanting  to  this  naked  old  man  ?  Ye 
drink  from  a  gem;  he  satisfied  nature  from  the  hollow  of  his  hands. 
Ye  weave  gold  into  your  tunics ;  he  had  not  even  the  vilest  garment, 
of  your  bond-slave.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  to  that  poor  man  Para- 
dise is  open ;  you,  gilded  as  you  are,  Gehenna  will  receive.  He.  tliough 
naked,  kept  the  garment  of  Christ;  you,  clothed  in  silk,  have  lost 
Christ's  robe.  Paul  lies  covered  with  meanest  dust,  to  rise  in  glory; 
you  are  crushed  by  wrought  sepulchres  of  stone,  to  bum  with  all 
your  works.  Spare,  I  beseech  you,  yourselves;  spare,  at  least,  the 
riches  which  you  love.  Why  do  you  wrap  even  your  dead  in  golden 
vestments  ?  Cannot  the  corpses  of  the  rich  decay,  save  in  silk  ?  I  be- 
seech thee,  whosoever  thou  art  that  readest  this,  to  remember  Hierony- 
mus  the  sinner,  who,  if  the  Lord  gave  him  choice,  would  much  sooner 
choose  Paul's  tunic  with  his  merits,  than  the  purple  of  kings  with  their 
punishments."— ["The  Hermits";  PhHadelphia  ed.,  1868  :  pp.  94-5. 
Canon  Kingsley's  trans. 

XLIV. :  p.  265. — "  They  deserve  the  name  of  faction  who  conspire 
to  bring  odium  on  good  men  and  virtuous,  who  cry  out  against  inno- 
cent blood,  offering  as  the  justification  of  their  enmity  the  baseless 
plea  that  they  think  the  Christians  the  cause  of  every  public  disaster, 
of  every  affliction  with  which  the  people  are  visited.  If  the  Tiber  rises 
as  high  as  the  city  walls,  if  the  Nile  does  not  send  its  waters  up  over 
the  fields,  if  the  heavens  give  no  rain,  if  there  is  an  earthquake,  if 
there  is  a  famine  or  a  pestilence,  straightway  the  cry  is,  '  Away  with 
the  Christians,  to  the  Lion ! ' " — [Tertullian :  Apolog. :  40. 

So  Augustine  said  nearly  two  centuries  later: — "  In  recounting  these 
things,  I  have  still  to  address  myself  to  ignorant  men ;  so  ignorant, 
indeed,  as  to  give  birth  to  the  common  saying,  '  Drought  and  Chris- 
tianity go  hand  in  hand.'  " — [Civ.  Dei:  II. :  3. 

XLV. :  p.  265. — Plato  had  said  long  before,  what  should  have  been 
realized,  if  anywhere,  in  the  reign  of  Marcus  Aurelius,  but  what  the 
persecuted  Christians  hardly  found  there : — 

' '  UntH  philosophers  are  kings,  or  the  kings  and  princes  of  this  world 
Lave  the  spirit  and  power  of  philosophy,  and  political  greatness  and 
wisdom  meet  in  one,  and  those  connnoner  natures  who  follow  either  to 
the  exclusion  of  the  other  are  compelled  to  stand  aside,  cities  will  never 
cease  from  ill — no,  nor  the  human  race,  as  I  believe — and  then  only 
will  this  our  State  have  a  possibility  of  life,  and  behold  the  light  of 
day."— ["Republic":  V.:  473. 

XLVI.:  p.  265. — "  Though  under  the  oppressive  bondage  of  the  body,^ 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  585 

though,  led  away  by  depraving  customs,  though  enervated  by  lust  and 
passion,  though  in  slavery  to  false  gods — yet,  whenever  the  soul  cornea 
to  itseK,  as  out  of  surfeit,  or  a  sleep,  or  a  sickness,  and  attains  something 
of  its  natural  soundness,  it  speaks  of  God ;  using  no  other  word,  be- 
cause this  is  the  peculiar  name  of  the  true  God.  .  .  O  noble  testimony 
of  the  soul,  by  nature  Christian  I  "—[Tertullian :  Apol.:  17.  (Comp. 
Test.  Animse,  passim). 

It  is  essentially  the  same  thought  which  Augustine  afterward  ex- 
l)ressed  in  his  "  Confessions  " :— "  Thou  movest  us  to  delight  in  prais- 
ing Thee;  for  Thou  hast  formed  us  for  Thyself,  and  our  hearts  aro 
restless  till  they  find  rest  in  Thee !  "—[I. :  1. 

XLVII.  :  p.  266. — "  Christ,  as  the  founder  of  a  system  of  mundane 
Ethics,  revises  and  overrules  all  bygone  moralities,  issuing  anew  what- 
ever is  of  unchangeable  obligation,  and  consigning  to  non-observance 
or  oblivion  whatever  had  a  temporary  force,  or  a  local  reason.  With 
a  touch,  with  a  word — a  word  full  of  far-reaching  inferences — he  rules 
the  ages  to  come :  and  he  so  sends  morality  forward,  he  so  launches  it 
into  the  boundless  futurity  of  the  human  system  on  earth,  as  that  it 
shall  need  no  redressing,  no  complementing,  no  retrenchment,  even 
in  the  most  distant  era.  This  is  done,  not  by  systematic  codification, 
but  by  the  characteristic  practice  of  instancing  at  the  critical  points, 
and  wherever  an  ambiguity  is  to  be  excluded.  Beauty  of  contour,  in 
the  human  form,  is  secured  by  the  ligaments  at  the  joints,  and  by  ad- 
hesions of  the  integuments  to  the  bony  structure  at  places.  It  is  so 
that  in  Christ's  apothegms,  in  his  apologues,  and  in  his  pointed  replies 
to  sophistical  questions,  he  imparts  a  divine  symmetry  and  majesty  to 
his  body  of  laws.  .  .  Christ's  law  wears  the  grace  of  heaven,  though 
it  be  firmly  knit  together,  as  law  must  be  if  it  is  to  hold  a  place  in  a 
world  such  as  this." — [Isaac  Taylor :  "Eestoration  of  Belief";  Boston 
od.,  1867:  pp.  261-2. 

XL VIII. :  p.  267. — "The  exclusion  from  the  greater  mysteries  at 
Eleusis  of  all  who  had  not  been  duly  prepared  and  passed  through  the 
little  ones,  was  so  strictly  kept  to  that  the  warders  of  the  temple  there 
once  had  two  Acarnanians  put  to  death  only  for  having  gone  in  with 
the  crowd,  by  mistake,  to  the  consecrated  area.  But  if  purity  was  de- 
sired in  those  who  were  to  be  initiated,  we  are  not  to  understand  by 
the  expression,  moral  purity  of  soul,  the  idea  of  which,  to  the  extent 
we  are  acquainted  with  it  as  an  ordinance  of  religion,  was  quite  strange 
to  heathendom.  If  a  man  had  touched  a  corpse,  he  was  just  as  impure 
OS  if  he  had  committed  murder;  and  if  one  killed  another,  whethei 
unintentionally  or  deliberately,  the  acts  were  here  equivalent.  Hence, 
too,  hetairai  were  unhesitatingly  admitted  to  the  mysteries,  and  tho 


586  J^^PENDIJT. 

means  of  purification  were  entirely  external  and  meclianical.  The^ 
consisted  in  part  of  ablutions  in  salt  and  fresh  water,  and  principally  ol 
fumigation  with  sulphur,  and  smearing  with  the  blood  of  a  sow  in 
young.  .  .  Plato,  speaking  with  unmistakable  reference  to  the  Eleu- 
sinia,  .  .  thought  that  this  rite  served  only  to  strengthen  and  make  a 
man  secure  in  imrighteousness." — [Bollinger  :  "  The  Gentile  and  the 
Jew";  London  ed.,  1863  :  Vol.  1 :  pp.  191,  200.  (See  the  Republic, 
II. :  363.) 

XLIX. :  p.  267. — Tacitus  refers  to  Christianity  simply  as  *  a  destruc- 
tive superstition ' ;  Suetonius,  as  '  a  new  and  malefic  superstition ' ; 
Pliny  the  Younger,  as  *a  perverse  and  extravagant  superstition.' 
Epictetus'  reference  to  the  Christians  is  incidental  and  disdainful : 
■"And  is  it  possible  that  any  one  should  be  thus  disposed  toward  these 
things  [the  guards  and  swords  of  a  tyrant]  from  madness,  and  the 
Galileans  from  mere  habit,  yet  that  no  one  should  be  able  to  learn, 
from  reason  and  demonstration,  that  God  made  all  things  in  the  world, 
and  all  its  parts  for  the  use  of  the  whole  ? " — [rv. :  7. 

Maixjus  Aurelius'  mention  of  them  is  equally  slight  and  contemptu- 
ous:— *'  What  a  soul  is  that  which  is  ready,  if  at  any  moment  it  must 
be  separated  from  the  body,  and  ready  either  to  be  extinguished  or 
dispersed,  or  to  continue  to  exist;  but  so  that  this  readiness  comes  from 
a  man's  own  judgment,  not  from  mere  obstinacy,  as  with  the  Chris- 
tians."—["Meditations":  XI.:  3. 

L. :  p.  268. — "A  final  clearance  of  the  gods  and  goddesses  was  to  be 
effected :  and  this,  not  by  the  gentle  means  of  philosophic  suasion,  but 
by  bringing  thousands  of  the  people,  in  all  provinces  of  the  Roman 
empire,  into  a  position  of  unavoidable  resistance  toward  the  govern- 
ment, neither  party  finding  it  possible  to  retreat  from  its  ground ;  not 
the  government,  because  the  first  principles  of  the  empire  were  im- 
pugned by  this  opposition ;  not  the  Christian  people,  because  it  was 
not  a  mere  opinion  that  sustained  their  position,  but  a  belief  toward  a 
Person,  whose  authority  they  regarded  as  paramount  to  every  other." — 
[Isaac  Taylor:  "Restoration  of  Belief";  Boston  ed.,  1867:  p.  72. 

LI.:  p.  269. — "We  who  bear  wisdom  not  in  our  dress  but  in  our 
mind,  we  do  not  speak  great  things,  but  we  live  them ;  we  boast  that 
we  have  attained  what  they  [the  philosophers]  sought  for  with  the  ut- 
most eagerness,  and  have  not  been  able  to  find.  .  .  How  beautiful  ia 
the  spectacle  to  God  when  a  Chi'istian  does  battle  with  pain ;  when  he 
is  dmwn  up  against  threats,  and  punishments,  and  tortures  ;  when, 
mocking  the  noise  of  death,  he  treads  under-foot  the  horror  of  the  ex- 
ecutioner;  when  he  raises  up  his  liberty  against  kings  and  princes,  and 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  581 

yields  to  God  alone,  whose  lie  is;  when,  triumphant  and  victoriois,  he 
tramples  upon  the  very  man  who  has  pronounced  sentence  against 
him  !  .  .  Yet  boys  and  young  women  among  us  treat  with  contempt 
crosses,  and  tortures,  wild  beasts,  and  all  the  bugbears  of  punishment, 
with  the  inspired  patience  of  suffering." — [Minucius  Felix:  '*Octa- 
vius^':  XXXVIII.,  xxxvii. 

LII. :  p.  271. — The  expectations  of  Christians  concerning  the  Immor- 
tality are  abundantly  shown  in  the  catacombs : — 

"  The  phrase  In  pace  appears  in  an  epitaph  a.d.  290,  and  after  the 
middle  of  the  next  century  is  rarely  absent ;  sometimes  standing  alone, 
sometimes  coupled  with  the  word  used  to  denote  the  death  or  burial, 
or  with  the  verb  quiescit.  The  prayer,  *  Mayest  thou  live  among  the 
saints,'  is  found  on  an  epitaph  of  a.d.  268;  and  *  Mayest  thou  be  re- 
freshed with  the  holy  souls,'  in  the  year  291 ;  and  in  the  year  307, 
'  Sweet  soul,  drink  and  live.'  .  .  Another  particular  worth  mention- 
ing about  these  ancient  epitaphs  is  that  the  souls  of  the  deceased  are 
not  unfrequently  called  '  spiritus  sancti.^  .  .  Scratched  in  the  mortar 
around  a  grave  in  the  lower  part  of  the  cemetery  of  Thraso :  '  Prima, 
thou  livest  in  the  glory  of  God,  and  in  the  peace  of  our  Lord  Jesus 
Clirist.'"— [Northcote  :  *' Epitaphs  of  the  Catacombs";  London  ed., 
1879:  pp.  30,  41,  89. 

LIII. :  p.  271. — "  For  the  sanctities  of  domestic  hfe,  and  for  the  pa- 
thetic beauty  of  maternal  love,  no  poet  had  a  deeper  sense  than  Eurip- 
ides. The  following  lines,  spoken  apparently  by  Danae,  make  ua 
keenly  regret  the  loss  of  the  tragedy  that  bore  her  name;  all  the  ten- 
derness of  the  Simonidean  elegy  upon  her  fable  seems  to  inspire  the 
maiden's  longing  for  a  child  to  fill  her  arms,  and  sport  upon  her  knee : — 

'  He,  leaping  to  my  arms  and  in  my  bosom, 
Might  haply  sport,  and  with  a  crowd  of  kisses 
Might  win  my  soul  forth  ;  for  there  is  no  greater 
Luve-charm  than  close  companionship,  my  Father.' 

'  'And  where  was  the  charm  of  children  ever  painted  with  more  feeling 
than  in  these  verses  from  the  same  play  ? 

'Lady,  the  sun's  light  to  our  eyes  is  dear, 
And  fair  the  tranquil  reaches  of  the  sea, 
And  flowery  earth  in  May,  and  bounding  waters ; 
And  so  right  many  fair  things  I  might  praise  ; 
Yet  nothing  is  so  radiant  and  so  fair 
As  for  souls  childless,  with  desire  sore-smitten. 
To  see  the  light  of  babes  about  the  house.' 

"  In  the  next  quotation,  beautiful  by  reason  of  its  plainness,  a  young 
man  is  reminded  of  the  sweetness  of  a  mother's  love:— 


588  APPENDIX. 

'  Nought  is  more  dear  to  children  than  their  mother. 
Sons,  love  your  mother  ;  for  there  is  no  love 
Sweeter  than  this  that  can  be  loved  by  men.'  " 

[Symonds  :  "  Greek  Poets  " :  Second  Series; 
London  ed.,  1876  :  pp.  289-290. 

LIV. :  p.  273. — Tertullian's  exhortations  against  feminine  luxury 
may  sometimes  have  heen  needed,  but  they  mark  the  vast  distinction 
between  the  women  to  whom  they  were  addressed  and  those  of  the 
society  of  the  earlier  Empire: — "I  know  not  whether  the  wrist  that 
has  been  wont  to  be  surrounded  with  the  bracelet  like  a  palm-leaf,  will 
endure  till  it  grow  into  the  numb  hardness  of  its  own  chain !  I  know 
not  whether  the  leg  that  has  rejoiced  in  the  anklet  will  suffer  itself  to 
be  squeezed  into  the  gy ve !  I  fear  that  the  neck  beset  with  pearl  and 
emerald  nooses  will  give  no  room  to  the  broadsword!  Wherefore, 
blessed  sisters,  let  us  meditate  on  hardships,  and  we  shall  not  feel 
them ;  let  u5  abandon  luxuries,  and  we  shall  not  regret  them.  Let  us 
cast  away  earthly  ornaments,  if  we  desire  heavenly ;  .  .  clothe  your- 
selves with  the  silk  of  uprightness,  the  fine  linen  of  holiness,  the  pur- 
XDle  of  modesty.  Thus  appareled,  you  wUl  have  God  as  your  Lover." 
--["On  Female  Dress":  IL  :  13. 

LV. :  p.  272. — Tacitus  treats  it  as  almost  a  recompense  for  the  ter- 
rible calamity  of  the  fall  of  the  amphitheatre  at  Fidenae,  by  which  he 
says  that  ^f  ty  thousand  persons  were  killed  or  maimed — [Suetonius 
numbers  the  killed  alone  at  twenty  thousand  :  ''Tiberius,"  XL.] — that 
"while  the  disaster  was  yet  recent,  the  houses  of  those  of  high  rank 
were  opened,  supplies  and  physicians  were  widely  furnished ;  and  the 
city  in  those  days,  though  sad  in  aspect,  was  likened  again  to  the  cus- 
toms of  those  in  old  days  who  were  wont  after  great  battles  to  succor 
the  wounded  with  largesses  and  with  care." — [Annal.  iv. :  63. 

LVI. :  p.  272. — The  Stoical  temper  is  well  expressed  by  Seneca,  in 
many  passages  like  these : 

"  He  [the  wise  man]  will  assist  others  in  the  time  of  their  tears,  but 
will  not  join  in  these ;  he  will  give  his  hand  to  the  shipwrecked,  hos- 
pitality to  the  banished  wanderer,  alms  to  the  needy,  etc.,  etc. :  but  he 
will  do  all  this  with  an  undisturbed  spirit,  an  imchanged  countenance. 
The  wise  man  will  therefore  not  be  moved  with  pity,  but  will  help 
others,  will  benefit  them,  as  one  born  for  the  common  assistance  and  the 
pubHc  good,  of  which  he  would  give  to  each  his  share.  .  .  Pity  is  a  vice 
of  minds  too  favorably  disposed  toward  suflFering." — [De  Clem.  n. :  6. 

"A  wise  man  is  not  afflicted  by  the  loss  of  children,  or  of  friends; 
he  bears  their  death  in  the  same  spirit  in  which  he  expects  his  own ;  he. 


NOTBS  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  689 

does  not  fear  the  one,  any  more  than  he  grieves  for  the  other.'  — [Ep 

LXXIV. 

"  One  is  ungrateful;  he  has  not  done  me  an  injury,  but  himself;  1 
had  the  benefit  of  my  gift  when  I  bestowed  it ;  nor  will  I  on  this  ac- 
count give  more  sluggishly,  but  with  greater  diligence ;  what  I  have 
lost  in  this  one,  I  will  regain  in  others.  Indeed  I  will  confer  benefit 
again  on  this  very  man,  and,  like  a  good  husbandman,  will  conquer 
the  sterility  of  the  soil  by  care  and  culture.  .  .  It  is  not  a  mark  of 
magnanimity  to  give  and  to  lose ;  this  is  the  evidence  of  such  greatness 
of  mind,  to  lose  and  still  to  give." — [De  Benef. :  vii, :  32. 

LVII. :  p.  273. — '*  Further,  admonishing  and  showing  whence  we 
may  be  clean  and  purged.  He  [the  Lord]  added  that  alms  must  be 
given.  He  who  is  pitiful  teaches  and  warns  us  that  pity  must  be 
shown ;  and  because  He  seeks  to  save  those  whom  at  a  great  cost  He 
has  redeemed.  He  teaches  that  those  who  after  the  grace  of  baptism 
have  become  foul  may  once  more  be  cleansed  [by  alms-giving]. " — [Cyp- 
rian :  ' '  Works  and  Alms  " ;  2. 

"  We  who  valued  above  all  things  the  acquisition  of  wealth  and  pos- 
sessions, now  bring  what  we  have  into  a  common  stock,  and  communi- 
cate to  every  one  in  need ;  we  who  hated  and  destroyed  one  another, 
and  on  account  of  their  different  manners  would  not  live  with  men 
of  a  different  tribe,  now,  since  the  coming  of  Christ,  live  familiarly 
with  them,  and  pray  for  our  enemies,  and  endeavour  to  persuade  those 
who  hate  us  unjustly  to  live  conformably  to  the  good  precepts  of  Christ, 
to  the  end  that  they  may  become  partakers  with  us  of  the  same  joyful 
hope  of  a  reward  from  God,  the  ruler  of  all." — [Justin  Martyr:  Apol. 
I. :  14. 

"Do  you  therefore,  O  bishops,  be  solicitous  about  their  maintenance, 
being  in  nothing  wanting  to  them ;  exhibiting  to  the  orphans  the  care 
of  parents ;  to  the  widows,  the  care  of  husbands ;  to  those  of  suitable 
age,  marriage;  to  the  artificer,  work;  to  the  unable,  commiseration; 
to  the  strangers,  a  house;  to  the  hungry,  food;  to  the  thirsty,  di'ink; 
to  the  naked,  clothing ;  to  the  sick,  visitation ;  to  the  prisoners,  assist- 
ance. Besides  these,  have  a  greater  care  of  the  orphans,  that  nothing 
may  be  wanting  to  them.  .  .  But  an  orphan  who,  by  reason  of  his 
youth,  or  he  that  by  the  feebleness  of  old  age,  or  the  incidence  of  dis- 
ease, or  the  bringing  up  of  many  children,  receives  alms — such  a  one 
shall  not  only  not  be  blamed,  but  shall  be  commended;  for  he  shall  be 
esteemed  an  altar  to  God,  and  be  honoured  by  God." — ["Apostolical 
Constitutions  " :  IV. :  2,  3. 

"  St.  Jerome  relates  how  Fabiola,  the  descendant  of  the  Fabii,  .  .  sold 
aU  her  goods,  and  raised  out  of  the  proceeds  a  hospital  for  tlie  poor, 
which  she  served  in  person.     Tlie  daughter  of  consuls  and  dictators 


590  APPENDIX. 

dressed  the  wounds  of  the  maimed  and  miserable,  of  slaves  whom  theil 
owners  had  discarded,  carried  the  epileptic  sufferers  on  her  own  shoul* 
ders,  staunched  the  blood  of  sores,  and  in  fine,  as  St.  Jerome  said, 
performed  all  the  services  which  wealthy  and  charitable  Christians 
were  accustomed  to  transact  by  the  hands  of  their  slaves.  But  a 
stronger  faith  conquered  all  natural  disgust;  and  therefore  popular 
veneration  attached  itself  to  the  woman  who  had  so  scorned  and 
trampled  upon  her  hereditary  grandeur,  that  she  might  become  the 
serving-maid  of  misfortune." — [Fred.  Ozanam:  "Hist,  of  Civilization, 
etc.";  London  ed.,  1867:  Vol.  II.:  p.  68. 

"Many  of  our  brethren,  through  their  exceeding  great  love  and 
brotherly  affection,  neglecting  themselves,  and  befriending  one 
another,  constantly  superintending  the  sick,  ministering  to  their 
wants  without  fear  and  without  cessation,  and  healing  them  in 
Christ,  have  died  most  willingly  with  them.  Filled  with  disease  from 
others,  catching  disorders  from  their  neighbors,  they  expressed  the 
pain  from  them  and  infused  it  into  themselves.  .  .  The  best  of  our 
brethren,  indeed,  have  departed  life  in  this  way,  some  presbyters,  some 
deacons,  and  of  the  people  those  that  were  exceedingly  commended.  .  . 
They  took  up  the  bodies  of  the  saints  with  then'  open  hands  and  on 
their  bosoms,  cleaned  then*  eyes,  and  closed  their  mouths,  carried  them 
on  their  shoulders,  and  composed  theh  limbs,  embraced,  clung  to  them, 
prepared  them  decently,  washing  and  wrapping  them  up,  and  ere 
long  they  themselves  shared  in  receiving  the  same  offices ;  those  that 
survived  always  following  those  before  them." — [Ep.  of  Dionysius^ 
after  Plague  at  Alexandria :  Eusebius :  Eccl.  Hist.  VII. :  22. 

LVIII. :  p.  273. — "A  decent  portion  was  reserved  for  the  mainte- 
nance of  the  bishop  and  his  clergy ;  a  sufficient  sum  was  allotted  for 
the  expenses  of  the  public  woi-ship,  of  which  the  feasts  of  love,  the 
agapcB  as  they  were  called,  constituted  a  very  pleasing  part.  The 
whole  remainder  was  the  sacred  patrimony  of  the  poor.  According  to 
the  discretion  of  the  bishop,  it  was  distributed  to  support  widows  and 
orphans,  the  lame,  the  sick,  and  the  aged  of  the  community ;  to  com- 
fort straugers  and  pilgrims ;  and  to  alleviate  the  misfortunes  of  prison- 
ers and  captives,  more  especially  when  their  suffeiings  had  been  occa- 
sioned by  their  firm  attachment  to  the  cause  of  religion.  .  .  The 
pagans,  while  they  derided  the  doctrines,  acknowledged  the  benevo- 
lence of  the  new  sect.  .  .  There  is  some  reason  likewise  to  believe 
that  great  numbers  of  infants  who,  according  to  the  inhuman  practice 
of  the  times,  had  been  exposed  by  their  parents,  were  frequently  res- 
cued from  death,  baptized,  educated,  and  maintamed  by  the  piety  of 
the  Christians,  and  at  the  expense  of  the  public  treasure." — [Giblon 
''Decline  and  Fall";  Boston  ed.,  1854:  Vol.  II.:  pp.  200-201. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  591 

'*  Neither  the  religion  nor  the  philosophy  of  Greece  and  Rome  tended 
to  comfort  the  poor.  The  divinities  were  cruel ;  the  Stoic  affected  to 
despise  the  sufferings  of  the  indigent ;  the  Epicurean  took  no  thought 
of  them.  Throughout  the  vast  regions  of  Mogul,  India,  and  China, 
the  use  of  hospitals  is  unknown  to  this  day.  In  no  country  did  Chris- 
tianity find  such  institutions  existing.  .  .  The  history  of  their  rise  and 
progress  can  be  traced  in  few  words.  In  the  year  380  the  first  hospital 
in  the  West  was  founded  by  Fabiola,  a  devout  Roman  lady,  without 
the  walls  of  Rome.  St.  Jerome  says,  expressly,  that  *  this  was  the  first 
of  all.'  And  he  adds  that  it  was  a  country-house,  destined  to  receive  the 
sick  and  the  infirm,  who  before  used  to  lie  stretched  on  the  public 
ways.  The  Pilgrims'  hospital  at  Rome,  built  by  Pammachius,  became 
also  celebrated.  In  330,  the  priest  Zotichus,  who  had  followed  Con- 
stantine  to  Byzantium,  established  in  that  city,  under  his  protection,  a 
hospice  for  strangers  and  pilgrims.  .  .  St.  Basil,  who  founded  the  first 
hospitals  of  Asia,  mentions  a  house  for  the  reception  of  the  sick  and  of 
travellers,  near  the  city  of  Cesarea,  which  became  afterwards  the  orna- 
ment of  the  country,  and  like  a  second  city.  St.  Chrysostom  built 
several  hospitals  at  Constantinople." — ["Mores  Catholici";  London 
ed.,1836;  Vol.  7:  pp.  408-9. 

LIX. :  p.  274. — Tacitus  speaks  of  Pomponia  Graecina,  a  distinguished 
woman,  married  to  Plautius,  who  received  an  ovation  on  his  return 
from  Britain,  as  accused  of  "a  foreign  supei-stition,"  and  remitted  to 
the  judgment  of  her  husband.  Being  pronounced  innocent  by  him, 
she  lived  to  a  great  age,  but  in  continual  sadness,  which  in  the  end 
turned  out  to  her  glory. — [Annal.  Xill. :  32. 

A  common  interpretation  of  the  incident  has  been  that  she  was  ac- 
cused of  being  a  Christian:  "And  this  interpretation  has  lately  re- 
ceived important  confirmation  by  the  discovery  in  a  very  ancient  crypt, 
near  the  catacomb  of  St.  Callixtus,  of  the  gravestones  of  a  Pomponius 
Grsecinus,  and  other  members  of  the  same  family,  showing  that  in  a 
very  early  period  of  the  Church's  history  some  of  them  were  undoubt- 
edly Christian." — ["Roma Sotterranea "  :  (Northcote  and  Brownlow) 
London  ed.,  1879:  Vol.  1:  pp.  82,  83. 

LX.  p.  274. — "  Flavins  Sabinus  seems  to  have  had  four  children,  of 
whom  the  most  conspicuous  was  Titus  Flavins  Clemens,  the  consul 
and  martyr.  He  married  the  daughter  of  his  cousin  who  was  sister  to 
the  Emperor  Domitian,  and  called  by  the  same  name  as  her  mother, 
Flavia  Domitilla.  .  .  The  facts  of  Clemens's  martyrdom  and  Domitilla'a 
banishment  are  attested  by  Dio  Cassius.  *  The  chai'ge  of  atheism  waa 
^^rought  against  them  both,  on  which  charge  many  others  also  had 
boon  condemned,  going  after  the  manners  and  customs  of  the  Jews 


592  APPENDIX. 

and  some  of  them  were  put  to  death,  and  others  had  their  goods  con- 
fiscated; but  Domitilla  was  only  banished  to  Pandatereia.' " — ["  Roma 
Sotterranea  " :  (Northcote  and  Brownlow) ;  London  ed.,  1879:  Vol.  1: 
pp.  84,  85. 

Gibbon  says  of  the  same  faxjts:  *'  The  guilt  imputed  to  their  charge 
was  that  of  atheism  and  Jewish  manners ;  a  singular  association  of 
ideas  which  cannot  with  any  propriety  be  applied  except  to  the  Chris- 
tians, as  they  were  obscurely  and  imperfectly  viewed  by  the  magi» 
trates  and  by  the  writers  of  that  period." — ["The  Decline  and  Fall"* 
London  ed.,  1848:  Vol.  2:  p.  183. 

LXI.  :  p.  274.—"  The  tradition  regarding  this  emperor  [Hadrian] 
that  he  caused  temples  to  be  dedicated  to  Christ,  is  the  more  improba- 
ble, because  he  entertained  very  erroneous  and  unfavorable  notions  of 
the  Christians.  .  .  Elagabalus  (218-222)  went  so  far  as  to  think  of 
blending  the  Christian  religion  with  the  worship  of  his  god.  Severus 
Alexander  (222-235)  and  his  mother,  Julia  Mammaea,  were  addicted 
to  a  sinilar  but  more  rational  syncretism,  and  gave  the  Christians 
many  proofs  of  their  good- will." — [Gieseler :  "  Church  History  " ;  New 
York  ed.,  1876.  Vol.  1:  pp.  125,  177. 

"  In  his  domestic  chapel  he  [Alexander  Severus]  placed  the  statues 
of  Abraham,  of  Orpheus,  of  Apollonius,  and  of  Christ,  as  an  honor 
due  to  those  respectable  sages  who  had  instructed  mankind  in  the  vari- 
ous modes  of  addressing  the  homage  to  the  supreme  and  universal 
Deity."— [Gibbon:  "The  Decline  and  FaU";  London  ed.,  1848:  Vol. 
n. :  p.  209. 

LXII. :  p.  274. — "  Undoubtedly  various  feelmgs  entered  into  the  de- 
mand for  the  persecution  of  the  Christians.  The  magistrate  regarded 
them  as  transgressors  of  a  principle  in  pubhc  law,  as  evil-doers,  as  fos- 
terers of  treason  and  sedition  ;  and  was  disposed  to  punish  them  ac- 
cordingly. But  the  people  generally,  and  sometimes  the  rulers  them- 
selves, yielded  to  a  superstitious  impulse  in  ascribing  to  their  rejection 
of  sacrifice  and  of  idol- worship  every  public  calamity,  which  testified, 
as  they  supposed,  to  the  wrath  of  the  offended  deities.  The  execution 
of  the  Christians  was  thus  popularly  regarded  as  a  means  of  propitia 
tion."— [Merivale :  "Boyle  Lectures";  New  York  ed.,  1865:  p.  251 
(note). 

LXHL:  p.  275. — "Suffer  me  to  become  food  for  the  wild  beasts, 
through  whose  instrumentality  it  will  be  granted  me  to  attain  to  God. 
I  am  the  wheat  of  God ;  and  let  me  be  ground  by  the  teeth  of  the  wild 
beasts,  that  I  may  be  found  the  pure  bread  of  Christ." — [Ignatius:  Ep, 
to  Romans :  iv. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  59S 

"  But  when  they  were  about  also  to  fix  him  [Polycarp]  with  nails, 
he  said,  '  Leave  me  as  I  am;  for  He  that  giveth  me  strength  to  endure 
the  fire,  will  also  enable  me,  without  your  securing  me  by  nails,  to  re- 
main without  moving  in  the  pile.'  They  did  not  nail  him  then,  but 
simply  bound  him.  And  he  .  .  looked  up  to  heaven,  and  said,  '  O 
Lord  Grod  Almighty,  .  .  I  give  Thee  thanks  that  Thou  hast  counted 
me  worthy  of  this  day  and  this  hour,  that  I  should  have  a  part  in  the 
number  of  Thy  martyrs,  in  the  cup  of  Thy  Christ,  to  the  resurrection 
of  eternal  life.'' — [Ep.  of  Church  at  Smyrna:  Xin.,  xiv. 

LXIV. :  p.  275. — "  Blandina  was  bound  and  suspended  on  a  stake^ 
and  thus  exposed  to  the  assaults  of  wild  beasts  ;  and  as  she  thus  ap- 
peared to  hang  after  the  manner  of  the  cross,  by  her  earnest  prayers 
she  infused  much  alacrity  into  the  contending  martyrs.  .  .  After  all 
these,  on  the  last  day  of  the  shows  of  gladiators,  Blandina  was  again 
brought  forth,  together  with  Ponticus,  a  youth  about  fifteen  years 
old.  .  .  And  thus,  after  scourging,  after  exposure  to  the  beasts,  after 
roasting,  she  was  finally  thrown  into  a  net,  and  cast  before  a  bull ; 
and  when  she  had  been  well  tossed  by  the  animal,  and  had  now  no 
longer  any  sense  of  what  was  done  to  her,  by  reason  of  her  firm  hope, 
confidence,  faith,  and  her  communion  with  Christ,  she  too  was  des- 
patched. Even  the  Gentiles  confessed  that  no  woman  among  them 
had  ever  endured  sufferings  as  many  and  great  as  these." — [Eusebius: 
Hist.  Eccl. :  V. :  1.     (Letter  from  Christians  in  Gaul.) 

Renan  has  clearly  recognized  the  immense  effect,  even  social  and 
pohtical,  of  the  wonderful  example  of  Blandina : — 

"Blandina  belonged  [as  a  slave]  to  a  Christian  lady,  who  had  no 
doubt  introduced  her  to  the  faith  of  Christ.  The  true  emancipation  of 
the  slave,  the  emancipation  by  heroism,  was  in  large  part  her  work. 
The  pagan  slave  was  considered  essentially  vicious,  without  moral  life. 
What  better  way  could  there  be  of  reinstating  him,  and  setting  him 
free,  than  by  showing  him  capable  of  the  same  virtues,  and  the  same 
sacrifices,  with  the  free  man  ?  How  was  it  possible  to  treat  with  dis- 
dain women  who  had  been  seen  in  the  amphitheatre  loftier  in  spirit 
than  their  mistresses  themselves  ?  .  .  We  hasten  to  say  that  it  was 
not  Spartacus  who  overthrew  slavery;  it  was,  far  more,  Blandina." — 
[Renan:  Marc-Aurele;  Paris  ed.,  1882:  pp.  312,  613. 

LXV. :  p.  275. — "Many  things  are  also  related  of  her  [Potamiaena's] 
fortitude  in  suffering  for  faith  in  Christ ;  and,  at  length,  after  horrible 
tortures  and  pains,  the  very  relation  of  wldch  makes  one  shudder,  she 
was,  with  her  mother  Macella,  committed  to  the  flames.  It  is  said  that 
the  Judge,  Aquila  by  name,  after  having  applied  the  severest  torture* 
to  her  on  every  part  of  her  body,  at  last  tlireatened  that  he  would  give 
38 


594  APPENDIX. 

her  body  to  be  abused  by  the  gladiators.  [Having  escaped  this,  and 
being  ordered  to  immediate  execution]  she  nobly  sustained  the  issue ; 
haWng  boiling  pitch  poured  over  different  parts  of  her  body,  by  little 
and  little,  from  her  feet  up  to  the  crown  of  her  head.  Such,  then,  was 
the  conflict  which  this  noble  virgin  endured." 

It  does  not  surprise  one  to  read,  further,  that  Basilides,  the  officer  to 
whom  her  execution  was  committed,  became  himself  a  Christian  after 
this  scene,  received  baptism,  and  "  bearing  a  distinguished  testimony  to 
the  Lord,  was  beheaded." — [Eusebius:  Hist.  Eccl. :  VI. :  5. 

LXVI. :  p.  276. — "  'After  a  few  days,  we  were  taken  into  the  dun- 
geon, and  I  was  very  much  afraid,  because  I  had  never  felt  such  dark- 
ness. O  terrible  day !  O  the  fierce  heat  of  the  shock  of  the  soldiery, 
because  of  the  crowds !  I  was  very  unusually  distressed  by  my  anx- 
iety for  my  infant.  .  .  Such  solicitude  I  suffered  for  many  days,  and 
I  obtained  leave  for  my  infant  to  remain  in  the  dungeon  with  me ;  and 
forthwith  I  grew  strong;  and  the  dungeon  became  to  me  as  it  were  a 
palace,  so  that  I  preferred  being  there  to  being  elsewhere.  .  .  And  I 
grieved  over  the  gray  hairs  of  my  father,  that  he  alone  of  all  my  fam- 
ily would  not  rejoice  over  my  passion.  And  I  comforted  him,  saying, 
On  that  scaffold  [high  platform]  whatever  God  wills  shall  happen. 
For  know  that  we  are  not  placed  in  our  own  power,  but  in  that  of 
God.  And  he  departed  from  me  in  sorrow.'  .  .  Perpctua  is  first  led 
in.  She  was  tossed,  and  fell  on  her  loins ;  and  when  she  saw  her  tunic 
torn  from  her  side,  she  drew  it  over  her  as  a  veil,  rather  mindful  of 
her  modesty  than  her  suffering.  Then  she  was  called  for  again,  and 
bound  up  her  dishevelled  hair;  for  it  was  not  becoming  for  a  martyr 
to  suffer  with  dishevelled  hair,  lest  she  should  appear  to  be  mourning 
in  her  glory.  .  .  And  when  the  populace  called  for  them  into  the 
midst,  that  as  the  sword  penetrated  their  body  they  might  make  their 
eyes  partners  in  the  murder,  they  [the  martyrs]  rose  up  of  their  own 
accord,  and  transferred  themselves  whither  the  people  wished ;  but  they 
first  kissed  one  another,  that  they  might  consummate  their  martyrdom 
with  the  kiss  of  peace." — ["Passion  of  Perpetua  and  Felicitas ":  I. :  2; 
n.:l;VL:3,  4. 

LXVII.  :  p.  277. — "And  why  have  I  also  surrendered  myself  to 
death,  to  fire,  to  the  sword,  to  the  wild  beast  ?  But  he  who  is  near  to 
the  sword  is  near  to  God;  he  that  is  among  the  wild  beasts  is  in  com- 
pany with  God;  provided  only  he  be  so  in  the  Name  of  Jesus  Christ." 
— [Ignatius :  Ep.  to  Smymaeans :  iv. 

"  You  have  borne  the  sharpest  examination  by  torture,  even  unto 
the  glorious  consummation,  and  have  not  yielded  to  sufferings,  but 
rather  the  sufferings  have  given  way  to  you.     The  end  of  torments, 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIIl.  595 

which  the  tortures  themselves  did  not  give,  the  crown  has  given.  .  . 
The  tortured  stood  more  brave  than  the  torturers;  and  the  limbs, 
beaten  and  torn  as  they  were,  overcame  the  hooks  that  bent  and  tore 
them.  The  scourge,  often  repeated  with  all  its  rage,  could  not  conquer 
invincible  faith,  even  although  the  membranes  which  enclosed  the  en- 
trails were  broken,  and  it  was  no  longer  the  limbs  l)ut  the  wounds  of 
the  servants  of  God  that  were  tortured.  Blood  was  flowing  which 
might  quench  the  blaze  of  persecution,  which  might  subdue  the  flames 
of  Gehenna,  with  its  glorious  gore." — [Cyprian:  Ep.  viii. 

"They  have  put  fetters  on  your  feet,  and  have  bound  your  blessed 
limbs,  and  the  temples  of  God,  with  disgraceful  chains,  as  if  the  spirit 
also  could  be  bound  with  the  body,  or  your  gold  could  be  stained  by  the 
contact  of  iron.  .  .  Oh,  feet  blessedly  bound,  which  are  loosed  not  by  the 
smith  but  by  the  Lord !  Oh,  feet  blessedly  bound,  which  are  guided  to 
Paradise,  in  the  way  of  salvation  1  Oh,  feet,  lingering  for  a  while 
among  the  fetters  and  cross-bars,  but  to  run  quickly  to  Christ  on  a 
glorious  road!  " — [Cyprian:  Ep.  Lxxvi.  (to  Martyrs  in  the  mines). 

"  It  is  of  God's  permitting,  that  we  thus  suffer.  For,  but  very  lately, 
in  condemning  a  Christian  woman  to  the  pimp  rather  than  to  the  lion, 
you  made  confession  that  a  taint  on  our  purity  is  considered  among 
us  something  more  terrible  than  any  punishment  and  any  death." — 
[TertuUian:  Apolog.  50. 

Of  Sanctus,  Eusebius  says: — "An  ambitious  struggle  in  torturing 
arose  between  the  governor  and  the  tormentors  against  him ;  so  that 
when  they  had  nothing  further  that  they  could  inflict,  they  at  last 
fastened  red-hot  plates  of  brass  to  the  most  tender  parts  of  his  body. 
But  he  continued  unsubdued  and  unshaken,  firm  in  his  confession, 
refreshed  and  strengthened  by  the  celestial  fountain  of  living  water 
that  flows  from  Christ.  But  the  corpse  itself  was  evidence  of  his  suf- 
ferings, as  it  was  one  continued  wound,  mangled  and  shrivelled,  that 
had  entirely  lost  the  form  of  man  to  the  external  eye." — [Eccl.  Hist. : 
v.:  1. 

LXVIII. :  p.  277. — "In  the  first  place,  martyrdom  is  not  in  your 
power,  but  in  the  condescension  of  God ;  neither  can  you  say  that  you 
have  lost  [by  a  preceding  natural  death]  what  you  do  not  know  wheth- 
er you  would  deserv^e  to  receive.  Then,  besides,  God,  the  Searcher  of 
the  reins  and  heart,  sees  you,  and  praises  and  approves  you;  and  He 
w^ho  sees  that  your  virtue  was  ready  in  you,  will  give  you  a  reward 
for  your  virtue.  .  .  It  is  one  thing  for  the  spirit  to  be  wanting  for  mar- 
tyrdom, and  another  for  martyrdom  to  have  been  wanting  for  the 
spirit."— [Cyprian:  "  On  the  Mortality  " :  17. 

"Since,  O  Son,  thou  desirest  martyrdom,  hear!  Thou,  indeed,  de- 
eirest  that  which  is  a  matter  suited  for  the  blessed.     First  of  all,  over 


596  APPENDIX, 

come  the  evil  one  with,  thy  good  acts,  by  living  well;  and  when  He^ 
thy  King,  shall  see  thee,  be  thou  secure.  .  .  Even  now,  if  thou  hasi 
conquered  by  good  deeds,  thou  art  a  martyr  in  Him.  Thou,  therefol-e, 
who  seekest  to  extol  martyrdom  with  thy  word,  in  peace  clothe  thy- 
seK  with  good  deeds,  and  be  secure." — [Commodianus :  "Christian 
Discipline":  LXll. 

."  If  he  who  kills  a  man  of  God  sins  against  God,  he  also  who  pre- 
sents himself  before  the  judgment-seat  becomes  guilty  of  his  death. 
And  such  is  the  case  with  him  who  does  not  avoid  persecution,  but  out 
of  daring  presents  himself  for  captui'e.  Such  a  one,  so  far  as  in  him 
lies,  becomes  an  accomplice  in  the  crime  of  the  persecutor.  And  if  he 
also  uses  provocation,  he  is  wholly  guilty,  challenging  the  wild  beast." 
[Clement  of  Alex. :  "Stromata":  iv. :  10. 

LXIX. :  p.  278. — "  For  I  myself,  too,  when  I  was  delighting  in  the 
doctrines  of  Plato,  and  heard  the  Christians  slandered,  and  saw  them 
fearless  of  death,  and  of  all  other  things  which  are  counted  fearful, 
perceived  that  it  was  impossible  that  they  could  be  living  in  wickednesa 
and  pleasure.  For  what  sensual  or  intemperate  man,  or  who  that 
coimts  it  good  to  feast  on  human  flesh  [of  which  Christians  were  ac- 
cused], could  welcome  death,  that  he  might  be  deprived  of  his  enjoy- 
ments, and  would  not  rather  continue  always  the  present  life,  and  at- 
tempt to  escape  the  observation  of  the  rulers  ?  And  much  less  would 
lie  denounce  himself,  when  the  consequence  would  be  death." — [Justin 
Martyr:  Apology  II. :  xii. 

LXX. :  p.  279. — "  It  would  be  difficult  to  overrate  its  influence  [that 
of  Christianity]  in  the  sphere  we  have  next  to  examine.  There  is 
scarcely  any  other  single  reform  so  impoiiant  in  the  moral  histx)iy  of 
mankind  as  the  suppression  of  the  gladiatorial  shows,  and  this  feat 
must  be  almost  exclusively  ascribed  to  the  Christian  Church.  When 
we  remember  how  extremely  few  of  the  best  and  greatest  men  of  the 
Roman  world  had  absolutely  condenuied  the  crimes  of  the  amphi- 
theatre, it  is  impossible  to  regard  without  the  deepest  admiration  the 
unwavering  and  uncompromising  consistency  of  the  patristic  denun- 
ciations. .  .  The  extinction  of  the  gladiatorial  spectacles  is,  of  all  the 
results  of  early  Chi*istian  influence,  that  upon  which  the  historian  can 
look  with  the  deepest  and  most  unmingled  satisfaction.  .  .  Christian- 
ity alone  was  powerful  enough  to  tear  this  evil  plant  from  the  Roman 
soil."— [Lecky:  "Hist,  of  Eui-opean  IVEorals";  New  York  ed.,  1876: 
Vol.2:  pp.  36-7,40,  41. 

LXXI. :  p.  279.— Under  the  light  of  the  vivid  Christian  beneficence, 
and  beneath  the  blaze  of  martyr-fires,  the  criticisms  of  Stuart  Mill  on 
the  Christian  morality  read  like  the  dreams  of  a  dyspeptic  recluse : — 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  VIII.  591 

*' Christian  morality  (so-called)  has  all  the  characters  of  a  reaction, 
it  is,  in  great  part,  a  protest  against  Paganism.  Its  ideal  is  negative, 
rather  than  positive;  passive,  rather  than  active;  Innocence,  rather 
than  Nobleness;  Abstinence  from  Evil,  rather  than  energetic  pursuit 
of  Good;  in  its  precepts  (as  has  been  well  said),  'thou  shalt  not'  pre- 
dominates unduly  over  'thou  shalt.'  In  its  horror  of  sensuality,  it 
made  an  idol  of  asceticism,  which  has  been  gradually  compromised 
away  into  one  of  legality.  .  .  It  is  essentially  a  doctrine  of  passive  obe- 
dience; it  inculcates  submission  to  all  authorities  found  established; 
who,  indeed,  are  not  to  be  actively  obeyed  when  they  command  what 
religion  forbids,  but  who  are  not  to  be  resisted,  far  less  rebelled  against, 
for  any  amount  of  vn:*ong  to  ourselves.  .  .  What  little  recognition 
the  idea  of  obligation  to  the  public  obtains  in  modem  morality,  is  de- 
rived from  Greek  and  Roman  sources,  not  from  Christian." 

Mr.  Mill  subsequently  concedes  that  "every  thing  which  is  exceUeut 
in  ethics  may  be  brought  within  the  sayings  of  Christ "  vdthout  exces- 
sive violence  to  their  language ;  but  he  leaves  the  preceding  remarks 
unchanged.— [Essay  "On  Liberty";  Boston  ed.,  1863  :  pp.  95-97. 

LXXII. :  p.  280. — "  Looking  with  human  eyes,  it  is  not  possible  to 
see  how  the  evil  could  have  been  avoided.  The  wickedness  long  en- 
trenched in  the  world ;  that  under-current  of  sin  which  runs  through 
the  nations ;  the  low  civilization  of  the  race ;  the  selfishness  of  strong 
men,  their  awful  wars;  the  hideous  sins  of  slavery,  polygamy;  the 
oppression  of  the  weak;  the  power  of  lust,  brutality,  and  every  sin, — 
these  were  obstacles  that  even  C!)hristianity  could  not  sweep  away  in  a 
moment,  though  strongest  of  the  daughters  of  God.  .  .  Let  us  judge 
these  men  lightly.  Low  as  the  church  was  in  the  third,  fourth,  fifth, 
and  sixth  centuries,  it  yet  represented  the  best  interests  of  mankind, 
as  no  other  institution. " — [Theodore  Parker :  ' '  Discourse  of  Religion  " ; 
Boston  ed.,  1842  :  pp.  403-4. 


NOTES  TO  LECTUEE  IX. 

Note  I. :  page  288. — The  followiiig  extracts,  from  widely  differing 
autliors,  illustrate  clearly  the  change  referred  to : — 

*' Nemesis  was  origmally,  as  it  appears,  a  goddess  of  nature,  only 
known  in  particular  localities,  and  honoured  at  Smyrna  and  Cyzicus, 
at  Patrae,  and  in  Asia  Minor,  but  especially  at  Ehamnus  in  Attica; 
and  in  that  character  she  was  mother  of  Helena  by  Zeus.  From  the 
time  of  the  Persian  wars  she  acquired  an  ethical  signification,  and  be- 
came the  goddess  of  justice,  assigning  to  each  his  measure,  and  giving 
every  one  his  due, — the  personification  of  the  jealousy  ascribed  to  the 
gods  by  the  ancients ;  and  hence  she  was  contemplated  often  as  an  in- 
imical power,  morose  and  threatening  toward  the  prosperous,  but  ever 
the  avenger  of  all  insolence." — [DoUinger  :  "The  Gentile  and  the 
Jew";  London  ed.,  1862  :  Vol.  1  :  p.  99. 

"  Nemesis  is  the  fundamental  idea  of  the  Greek  drama.  It  appears 
strongest  in  ^schylus,  as  a  prophetic  and  awful  law,  mysteriously 
felt,  and  terribly  revealed.  Sophocles  uses  it  to  point  the  deep  morali- 
ties which  govern  human  life.  In  Euripides  it  degenerates  into  some- 
thing more  akin  to  a  sense  of  vicissitudeg ;  it  becomes  more  sentimental 
—less  a  religious  or  moral  principle  than  a  phenomenon  inspiring  fear 
and  pity.  .  .  Entirely  to  eliminate  the  idea  of  Nemesis  which  gave  its 
character  to  Greek  tragedy  was  what  Euripides,  had  he  been  so  in- 
clined, could  hardly  have  succeeded  in  effecting.  Thougn  he  never 
impresses  on  our  minds  the  dogma  of  an  avenging  deity,  like  .^schy- 
lus,  or  of  an  inevitable  law,  like  Sophocles,  he  makes  us  feel  the  chance 
and  change  of  human  life,  the  helplessness  of  man,  the  stormy  sea  of 
passions,  sorrows,  and  vicissitudes  on  which  the  soul  is  tossed,  .  . 
With  him,  the  affairs  of  life  are  no  longer  based  upon  a  firm  founda- 
tion of  Divine  law,  but  gods  intervene  mechanically  and  freakishly, 
like  the  magicians  in  Ariosto  or  Tasso.  Their  agency  is  valuable,  not 
as  determining  the  moral  conduct  of  the  personages,  but  as  an  exhibi- 
tion of  supernatural  power  which  brings  about  a  sudden  revolution  of 
events." — [Symonds:  "Greek  Poets"-  First  Series;  London  ed.,  1877: 
pp.  204,  215-17. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IJT.  599 

II.:  p.  289. — ''Nature!  we  are  surrounded  and  embraced  by  her: 
powerless  to  separate  ourselves  from  her,  and  powerless  to  penetrate 
beyond  her.  Without  asking  or  warning,  she  snatches  us  up  into  her 
circling  dance,  and  whirls  us  on  until  we  are  tired,  and  drop  from  her 
arms.  .  .  She  is  always  building  up  and  destroying ;  but  her  workshop 
is  inaccessible.  .  .  She  rejoices  in  illusion.  Whoso  destroys  it  in  him- 
self and  others,  him  she  punishes  with  the  sternest  tyranny.  .  .  She 
tosses  her  children  out  of  nothingness,  and  tells  them  not  whence  they 
came,  nor  whither  they  go.  It  is  their  business  to  run,  she  knows  the 
road.  She  wraps  man  in  darkness,  and  makes  him  forever  long  for 
light.  She  creates  him  dependent  upon  the  earth,  dull  and  heavy; 
yet  is  always  shaking  him  until  he  attempts  to  soar  above  it.  .  .  She 
is  vanity  of  vanities ;  but  not  to  us,  to  whom  she  has  made  herself  of 
the  greatest  importance." — [Goethe  :  Aphorisms  on  Nature  :  trans,  by 
T.  H.  Huxley,  in  "Nature,"  Vol.  1  :  pp.  9-10.  (Goethe's  "  Werke"; 
Stuttgart,  1881;  Band  xxxvi. :  S.  227,  f.) 

III.:  p.  289. — "It  teaches  [the  doctrine  of  transmigration]  that  the 
present  life  is  but  one  of  an  indefinite  series  of  existences  which  each 
individual  soul  is  destined  to  pass  through ;  that  death  is  only  the  ter- 
mination of  one,  and  the  entrance  upon  another,  of  the  series.  Fur- 
ther, it  holds  that  all  life  is  one  in  essence ;  that  there  is  no  fundamen- 
tal difference  between  the  vital  principle  of  a  human  being  and  that  of 
any  other  living  creature ;  so  that,  when  a  soul  quits  its  tenement  of 
flesh,  it  may  find  itseK  next  imprisoned  in  the  body  of  some  inferior 
animal;  being,  in  fact,  liable  to  make  experience  of  all  the  various 
forms  of  life,  in  its  progress  toward  the  final  consummation  of  its  ex- 
istence. .  .  The  inexorable  fate  which  dooms  each  creature  to  a  re- 
peated entrance  upon  a  life  full  of  so  many  miseries  in  the  present, 
fraught  with  such  dangers  for  the  future,  is  what  the  Hindu  dreads, 
and  would  escape.  He  flies  from  existence,  as  the  sum  of  all  miseries ; 
the  aim  of  his  life  is  to  make  sure  that  it  be  the  last  of  him.  .  .  The 
antiquity  of  this  strange  doctrine,  and  its  dominion  over  the  popular 
mind  of  India,  are  clearly  shown  by  the  fact  that  even  Buddhism,  the 
popular  I'evolution  against  the  creeds  and  the  forms  of  the  Brahmanic 
religion,  implicitly  adopted  it,  venturing  only  to  teach  a  new  and  more 
effective  method  of  escaping  from  the  bonds  of  existence  into  the 
longed-for  freedom  of  nonentity." — [Prof.  W.  D.  Whitney:  "Oriental 
and  Linguistic  Studies":  1st  Series;  New  York  ed.,  1872  :  pp.  46-7. 

IV.:  p.  290. — "They  [the  Egyptians]  were  also  the  first  to  broach 
the  opinion  that  the  soul  of  man  is  immortal,  and  that,  when  the  body 
dies,  it  enters  into  the  form  of  an  animal  which  is  bom  at  the  moment, 
thence  passing  on  from  one  animal  into  another,  until  it  has  circled 


600  APF^JSTDUr. 

througli  the  forms  of  all  the  creatures  which  tenant  the  eartli,  th€ 
water,  and  the  air,  after  which  it  enters  agam  into  a  human  frame, 
and  is  born  anew.  The  whole  period  of  the  transmigration  is,  they 
say,  three  thousand  years.  There  are  Grreek  writers,  some  of  an  earlier, 
some  of  a  later  date,  who  have  borrowed  this  doctrine  from  the  Egyp- 
tians, and  put  it  forward  as  their  own.  I  could  mention  their  names, 
but  abstain  from  doing  so. " — [Herodotus :  II. :  123. 

"He  himself  [Empedocles,  of  Agrigentum]  had  already  been  bird 
shrub,  and  fish,  young  man  and  maiden.  .  .  As  even  the  spirits  nearest 
of  kin,  when  enclosed  in  strange  bodies,  did  not  recognize  one  another 
here  below,  it  came  to  pass  that  by  putting  animals  to  a  painful  death, 
and  eating  them,  the  son  sinned  against  the  father,  the  children  of  her 
womb  against  their  mother,  for  they  fed  on  the  flesh  of  their  parents ; 
and  therefore  the  sparing  of  animal  life,  and  abstinence  from  flesh- 
meat,  became  a  sacred  obligation.  If  the  philosopher  did  not  extend 
this  further,  to  the  vegetable  world,  he  only  abstained  from  so  doing 
partly  on  the  score  of  impossibility,  partly  on  the  hypothesis  that  by 
the  destruction  of  vegetable  existence  the  transition  into  a  higher 
organism  was  rendered  possible  to  the  indwelling  spirit." — [Dollinger: 
"  The  Gentile  and  the  Jew  ";  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  1:  p.  265. 

v.:  p.  291. — "Connected  with  the  re-awakening  of  the  dead,  at 
least  in  some  of  the  more  recent,  or  post-Christian,  writings  of  the 
Persians,  there  is  frequent  mention  of  a  glorious  hero-prophet,  by 
whose  mmistry,  as  one  chief  organ  of  Ormazd,  the  empire  of  the  devs 
shall  be  subverted,  earth  herself  shall  be  restored  to  something  of  her 
pristine  glory,  and  the  wrongs  of  man  redressed.  Tlie  name  of  this 
expected  champion  of  the  Perso- Aryan  race  is  Sosiosh  (the  Benefactor). 
.  .  The  meagre  hint  of  Sosiosh,  thus  communicated  in  the  early  part 
of  the  Avesta,  was  expa,nded  and  embellished  in  the  works  of  the  Sas- 
sanian  epoch,  and  especially  in  the  Bundehesh,  That  benefactor  was 
from  first  to  last  a  man ;  and  like  two  other  beings,  his  precursors, 
now  associated  with  him  in  the  work  of  liberation,  and  each  reigning 
in  succession  for  a  thousand  years,  he  was  distinctly  held  to  be  the  off- 
spring of  the  holy  Zoroaster ;  yet  the  name  of  Sosiosh  alone,  as  great- 
est or  as  last  in  order  of  the  hero-prophets,  was  the  rallying-point 
where  Persians  were  accustomed  to  find  refuge  from  the  miseries  of 
their  present  lot." — [Hardwick:  "  Christ,  and  other  Masters  "  ;  London 
ed.,  1882:  pp.  566-7. 

VI. :  p.  291. — "  Now  comes  the  last  age  of  the  Cumeean  Song;  the 
great  series  of  the  centuries  is  bom  anew.  At  length  the  Virgin  re- 
turns ;  returns  the  Saturnian  reign ;  at  length  a  new  generation  of  men. 
is  sent  down  from  high  heaven."— [Virgil:  Eclogue  rv. :  4-7. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IX.  6C1 

VII. :  p.  291. — "  But  among  all  the  useful  institutions  that  demon- 
strate the  superior  excellence  of  the  Roman  Government,  the  most 
considerable  perhax)s  is  the  opinion  which  the  people  are  taught  to  hold 
concerning  the  gods ;  and  that  which  other  men  regard  as  an  object  of 
disgrace,  appears  in  my  judgment  to  be  the  very  thing  by  which  this 
republic  is  chiefly  sustained.  I  mean  superstition ;  which  is  impressed 
with  all  its  terrors,  and  which  influences  both  the  private  actions  of 
the  citizens,  and  the  public  administration  of  the  state,  to  a  degree  that 
can  scarcely  be  exceeded.  .  .  As  the  people  are  always  fickle  and  in- 
constant, filled  with  irregular  desires,  precipitate  in  then'  passions,  and 
prone  to  violence,  there  is  no  way  to  restrain  them  but  by  the  dread 
of  things  unseen,  and  by  the  pageantry  of  terrifying  fiction.  The  an- 
cients therefore  acted  not  absurdly,  nor  without  good  reason,  when 
they  inculcated  the  notions  concerning  the  gods,  and  the  belief  of  in- 
fernal punishments." — [Polybius:  G-en.  Hist.:  VI.:  Ex.  3. 

This  philosophy  of  the  usefulness  of  religion  was  recognized  by  Vol- 
taire himself,  in  the  famous  line  on  which  he  is  said  to  have  prided 
himself,  that  ' '  If  there  were  no  God,  it  would  be  necessary  to  invent 
one  "  (Si  Dieu  n'  existait  pas,  il  faudrait  Tin  venter). — [Epitre,  CXi. : 
<Euvi-es;  Paris  ed.,  1876:  Tom.  II.:  p.  649. 

Part  of  Plutarch's  essay  on  the  ' '  Fortune  of  the  Romans  "  has  been 
lost,  but  he  seems  to  have  expressed  his  governing  thought  about  the 
matter  in  sentences  like  these,  from  the  portion  which  we  have : — 

"  I  think  it  may  be  truly  affirmed  that,  notwithstanding  the  fierce 
and  lasting  wars  which  have  been  between  Virtue  and  Fortune,  they  did 
both  amicably  conspire  to  rear  the  structure  of  her  [Rome's]  vast  empire 
and  power,  and  join  their  united  endeavours  to  fijiish  the  most  beautiful 
work  that  ever  was  of  human  production.  .  .  For  want  of  one  supreme 
ruler  over  all,  while  all  aspired  to  rule,  the  world  was  filled  with  un- 
speakable violence,  confusion,  and  revolution  in  all  things,  until  such 
time  as  Rome  was  raised  to  its  just  strength  and  greatness,  which,  com- 
prehending under  her  power  many  strange  nations,  and  even  trans- 
marine dominions,  did  lay  the  foundation  of  firmness  and  stability  in 
the  greatest  of  human  affairs ;  for  by  this  vast  compass  of  one  and  the 
same  empire,  government  was  secured  as  in  an  unmovable  circle, 
resting  upon  the  centre  of  peace.  .  .  It  is  manifest  to  him  that  will 
reason  aright,  that  the  abundance  of  success  which  advanced  the 
Roman  empire  to  such  vast  power  and  greatness  is  not  to  be  attributed 
to  human  strength  and  counsels,  but  to  a  certain  divine  impulse,  and  a 
full  gale  of  running  Fortune,  which  carried  aU  before  it  that  hindered 
the  rising  glory  of  the  Romans." — [Plutarch:  "  Morals  ";  Boston  ed., 
1874:  Vol.  4:  pp.  199,  200,  214. 

Vni. :  p.  292.— "Never  would  the  oracle  at  Delphi  have  been  so 


602  APPENDIX, 

celebrated  and  famous,  nor  replenished  with  so  many  gifts  from  alj 
peoples  and  kings,  unless  each  age  had  had  experience  of  the  truth  oi 
its  oracles.  Now,  for  a  long  time,  it  has  not  done  this  [given  true  re- 
sponses]. As  then  it  is  now  in  less  repute,  because  the  truth  of  its 
oracles  is  less  sui'passing,  so  formerly  it  could  not  have  had  so  much 
I'enown  except  by  reason  of  its  preeminent  truth.  Perhaps  the  force 
of  the  earth,  which  agitated  with  a  divine  afflatus  the  mind  of  Pythia, 
has  vanished  with  age ;  as  we  see  certain  streams  dry  up,  or  turned 
and  twisted  into  another  channel." — [Cicero:  De  Divin. :  I.:  19. 

Strabo  said: — "Many  things  having  already  been  said  by  us  con- 
cerning the  oracle  of  Ammon,  we  add  only  this:  In  ancient  days, 
divination  in  general,  and  oracles,  were  held  in  the  highest  honor; 
now  the  same  are  completely  neglected,  the  Romans  being  content 
with  the  oracular  words  of  the  Sibyl,  and  v/ith  Etruscan  divination  by 
inspection  of  entrails,  interpretation  of  omens,  and  observations  of  the 
heavens.  Therefore  the  oracle  is  almost  wholly  deserted,  which  was 
formerly  held  in  such  high  esteem." — [Strabo:  Rer.  Geog:  xvii. ; 
43;  (Oxford  ed.,  1807:  Tom.  II.:  p.  1152.) 

IX. :  p.  292. — "  For  at  that  time  men  were  guests  of  the  gods,  and 
fed  at  the  same  tables  with  them,  on  account  of  their  justice  and  piety. 
Hence,  without  any  delay,  and  in  a  very  conspicuous  manner,  the 
pious  were  honored  by  the  gods,  and  the  impious  were  punished. 
Afterwards,  too,  the  pious  were  changed  from  men  into  gods;  and 
these  are  even  honored  at  present.  .  .  Now,  however,  when  vice  has 
spread  itself  throughout  every  part  of  the  earth,  the  divine  nature  is 
no  longer  produced  out  of  the  human ;  or,  in  other  words,  men  are  no 
longer  gods,  but  are  only  dignified  with  the  appellation  in  immoderate 
flattery ;  and  in  consequence  of  their  unjust  conduct  while  they  live 
on  the  earth,  they  experience  the  wrath  of  divinity  when  they  go 
hence." — [Pausanias:  "Descript.  of  Greece":  vill. :  2. 

X. :  p.  292. — "  He  added  to  both  the  numbei's  and  the  dignity  of  the 
priests,  and  increased  their  revenues,  especially  in  the  case  of  the  vestal 
virgins.  When,  to  fill  the  place  of  one  of  these  who  had  died,  it  was 
needful  that  another  be  taken  \lit.  be  captured],  and  many  solicited 
that  the  names  of  their  daughters  should  not  be  placed  upon  the  hst, 
he  swore  that  if  either  of  his  own  grand-daughters  were  of  competent 
age  she  should  have  been  offered." — [Suetonius:  Octav.  August. :  xxxi 

' '  In  order  that  the  public  esteem  of  the  priests  might  be  increased, 
and  their  own  spirit  be  made  more  ardent  for  the  sacred  services  to  be 
performed,  it  was  decreed  [under  Tiberius]  that  to  the  vestsil  virgin  Cor- 
nelia, who  had  been  taken  in  place  of  Scantia,  two  thousand  great  ses- 
terces should  be  given  [$80,000],  and  that  as  often  as  Augusta  should 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IX.  608 

enter  the  theatre  she  should  take  her  place  in  the  seals  of  the  vestals." — 
[Tacitus:  Aniial. :  IV.:  16. 

XI.  :  p.  293. — "After  that,  Lepidus  heing  dead,  he  [Augustus]  at 
length  assumed  the  office  of  Pontifex  Maximus,  which  he  had  not  ven- 
tured to  take  while  Lepidus  lived,  he  caused  the  prophetical  books  of 
whatever  sort,  either  in  Greek  or  in  Latin,  to  be  brought  together,  and 
more  than  two  thousand  of  those  thus  collected  from  all  quarters  he 
burned,  the  authors  of  them  being  unknown,  or  little  adapted  to  their 
office  ;  and  onjy  the  Sibylline  books  he  retained,  and  even  these  with 
a  careful  selection  ;  and  he  deposited  them  in  two  gilded  chests,  at  the 
base  of  the  statue  of  the  Palatine  Apollo." — [Suetonius :  Octav.  August. : 

XXXI. 

XII. :  p.  294. — "At  last  he  [Marius]  hatched  that  execrable  sedition, 
which  wrought  Rome  more  mischief  than  all  her  enemies  together 
had  done,  as  was  indeed  foreshown  by  the  gods.  For  a  flame  broke 
forth  of  its  own  accord,  from  under  the  staves  of  the  ensigns,  and  was 
with  difficulty  extinguished.  Three  ravens  brought  their  young  into 
the  open  road,  and  ate  them,  carrying  the  relics  into  the  nest  again. 
Mice  having  gnawed  the  consecrated  gold  in  one  of  the  temples,  the 
keepers  caught  one  of  them,  a  female,  in  a  trap  ;  and  she  bringing 
forth  five  young  ones  in  the  very  trap,  devoured  three  of  them.  But 
what  was  greatest  of  all,  in  a  calm  and  clear  sky,  there  was  heard  the 
sound  of  a  trumpet,  with  such  a  loud  and  dismal  blast  as  struck  terror 
and  amazement  into  the  hearts  of  the  people.  .  .  Whilst  the  Senate 
sat  in  consultation  with  the  soothsayers,  concerning  these  prodigies,  in 
the  temple  of  Bellona,  a  sparrow  came  flying  in,  before  them  all,  with 
a  grasshopper  in  its  mouth,  and  letting  fall  one  part  of  it,  flew  away 
with  the  remainder.  The  diviners  foreboded  commotions  and  dissen- 
sions between  the  great  landed  proprietors  and  the  common  city  popu- 
lace ;  the  latter,  like  the  grasshopper,  being  loud  and  talkative,  while 
the  sparrow  might  represent  the  '  dwellers  in  the  field.'" — [Plutarch: 
"Lives";  Boston  ed. ,  1859 :  Vol.  3:  pp.  150-151. 

XIII. :  p.  294. — "Many  prodigies  happened  in  this  year.  The  Cap 
itol  was  settled  upon  by  ill-omened  birds  ;  houses  were  thrown  down 
by  frequent  shakings  of  the  earth ;  and,  as  wider  mischief  was  feared, 
in  the  fright  of  the  populace  every  weaker  person  was  trampled  down. 
The  failure  of  crops,  with  the  famine  thence  arising,  was  regarded  as  a 
prodigy.  Nor  were  the  complaints  secret  only,  but  with  tumultuous 
darnel's  people  surrounded  Claudius  when  admmistermg  the  laws, 
and  droT  e  him  by  force  to  the  furthest  part  of  the  Forum,  till  amid  a 
circle  of  soldiers  he  broke  through  the  incensed  ci*owds. " — [Tacitus 
Annal. :  xil. :  43. 


604  APPENDIX. 

XIV. :  p.  295. — "A  want  of  acquaintance  with  nature,  an  eager  de- 
sire and  readiness  to  find  something  of  the  wonderful  in  tilings  the 
most  insignificant,  and  a  boundless  credulity,  multiplied  these  signs  oi 
warning  to  such  a  degree  that  we  can  only  dwell  with  astonishment 
on  the  indefatigable  anxiety  of  the  Senate  in  taking  them  all  into  ac- 
count. Not  only  eclipses  of  sun  and  moon,  but  other  phenomena  of 
both  these  heavenly  bodies,  rainbows  of  unusual  colours,  shooting 
stars,  and  abortions  of  man  and  beast,  entered  into  the  list  of  these 
prodigies.  Then  there  were  showers  of  stones,  earth,  chalk,  and  ashes ; 
idols  shed  tears  or  sweated  blood,  oxen  spoke,  men  were  changed  into 
women,  cocks  into  hens,  lakes  or  brooks  ran  with  blood  or  milk,  mice 
nibbled  at  the  golden  vessels  of  the  temples,  a  swarm  of  bees  lighted 
on  a  temple  or  in  a  public  place,  or  lightning  struck  a  temple  or  other 
public  building,  an  occurrence  especially  alarming.  For  all  these 
prodigies,  which  terrified  Senate  and  people,  a  procuration  was  neces- 
sary ;  that  is,  they  had  to  be  averted  by  prayer  and  expiatory  rites ;  for 
the  favor  of  the  threatening  or  angry  deity  had  to  be  reconquered."— 
[DoUinger:  "Gentile  and  Jew";  London  ed.,  1862:  Vol.  II.:  pp.  99- 
100. 

XV. :  p.  295. — There  is  equal  sadness  and  severity  in  the  words  in 
which  Tacitus  describes  the  theme  with  which  he  was  forced  in  the 
Annals  to  occupy  his  pen,  the  state  of  the  empire  after  Augustus  : — 

' '  But  no  one  may  compare  our  Annals  with  the  writmgs  of  those 
who  arranged  accounts  of  the  ancient  affairs  of  the  Roman  people. 
They  related,  with  free  digression,  vast  wars,  the  storm  of  cities,  kings 
routed  and  captured,  or,  if  at  any  time  they  turned  to  internal  affairs, 
the  struggles  of  Consuls  against  Tribunes,  the  agrarian  and  the  grain 
laws,  the  contests  of  plebeians  and  patricians.  To  us  remains  an  in- 
glorious labor,  on  a  narrow  field.  .  .  For  the  locations  of  nations,  the 
various  fortunes  of  battles,  the  famous  deaths  of  leaders,  hold  and  re- 
fresh the  attention  of  readers ;  but  we  bring  together  cruel  mandates, 
constant  accusations,  deceitful  friendships,  the  destruction  of  the  inno- 
cent, in  an  obvious  monotony  and  wearisomeness  of  things.  .  .  Even 
fame  and  virtue  find  some  enraged  by  them,  as  if  attacking  their  dif- 
ferent traits  by  examples  too  close  at  hand.  But  I  return  to  what  has 
been  begun." — [Tacitus:  Annal. :  iv. :  32,  33. 

The  effect  of  his  times  on  the  mind  of  the  great  historian  is  clearly 
traced  by  Merivale : — 

**  In  the  Dialogue  on  Oratory,  his  earliest  utterance,  he  displays  a 
just  sense  of  the  evil  tendencies  of  his  day ;  but  his  rebuke  to  the 
spirit  of  the  age  is  tempered  with  gentleness  and  reserve,  and  shows  at 
least  a  disposition  to  appreciate  every  element  of  good.  .  .  The  His- 
tories abound  in  keen  discrimination  of  crimes  and  vices,  and  in  bura 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IX.  605 

ing  sarcasms  on  wickedness  in  high  places ;  yet  even  in  tho  Histories 
the  dark  picture  of  sin  and  suffering  is  relieved  by  some  broader  views 
of  incidents  and  manners.  .  .  But  the  Annals,  the  latest  of  the  au- 
thor's works,  the  most  mature  and  finished  of  his  productions,  is  almost 
wholly  satire.  Tacitus  rarely  averts  his  eyes  from  the  central  figure 
of  monstrous  depravity,  around  which,  in  his  view,  all  society  i& 
grouped.  He  paints  the  age  all  Tiberius,  or  all  Nero.  Like  the  Roman 
soldier  chained  to  his  own  prisoner,  he  fin.ds  no  escape  from  the  hor- 
rors he  has  undertaken  to  delineate.  He  enjoys  no  relief  himself,  and 
he  allows  none  to  his  reader." — ["  Romans  under  the  Empire";  Lon- 
don ed.,  1862;  Vol.  7:  pp.  342-3. 

Yet  Tacitus  was  the  man,  among  all  those  of  distinguished  genius  at 
the  time,  who  seemed  to  the  amiable  and  cultivated  Pliny  the  Younger 
most  worthy  to  be  imitated,  and  with  whose  name  he  was  most  grati- 
fied to  have  his  own  associated. — [Ep.  vn. :  20. 

XVI. :  p.  295. — Ammianus  Marcel!  in  us,  the  clear-sighted,  modest, 
honest,  and  resolute  soldier,  who  wrote  as  a  Pagan,  though  he  wrote 
after  Constantine,  furnishes  in  his  Roman  History  frequent  and  strik- 
ing illustrations  of  the  bewildering  fears  which  even  in  his  time  pos- 
sessed the  souls  of  brave  men  when  any  unusual  occurrence  was  no- 
ticed.    Among  them  are  such  examples  as  these : — 

' '  At  that  time  a  monster,  horrible  both  to  see  and  to  describe,  was 
produced  at  Daphne,  a  beautiful  and  celebrated  suburb  of  Antioch: 
namely,  an  infant  with  two  mouths,  two  sets  of  teeth,  two  heads,  four 
eyes,  and  only  two  very  short  ears.  Such  a  misshapen  offspring  was 
an  omen  that  the  republic  would  become  deformed." — [xix. :  12:  19. 

''For  several  days  in  succession  many  terrible  omens  were  seen  [at 
Antioch],  as  if  the  gods  were  offended,  since  those  who  were  skilled  in 
the  interpretation  of  prodigies  foretold  that  impending  events  would 
be  melancholy.  For  the  statue  of  Maximian  Caesar,  which  was  placed 
in  the  vestibule  of  the  palace,  suddenly  lost  the  brazen  globe,  formed 
after  the  figure  of  the  heavens,  which  it  bore  in  its  hand.  Also  the 
beams  in  the  council-chamber  sounded  with  an  ominous  creak ;  comets 
were  seen  in  the  daytime." — [xxv. :  10:  1,  2. 

"At  this  time  a  new  kind  of  prodigy  appeared  in  the  com  district  of 
Tuscany ;  those  who  were  skillful  in  interpreting  such  things  being 
wholly  ignorant  of  what  it  portended.  For  in  the  town  of  Pistoia,  at 
about  the  third  hour  of  the  day,  in  the  sight  of  many  persons,  an  ass 
mounted  the  tribunal,  where  he  was  heard  to  bray  loudly.  All  the 
bystanders  were  amazed,  as  were  all  those  who  heard  of  the  occurrence, 
as  no  one  could  conjecture  what  was  to  happen." — [xxvn. :  3:  1. 

"In  that  town  [Bregitio]  his  Destiny,  by  numerous  prodigies,  por- 
tended to  him  [Valentinian]  his  approaching  fate.     For  a  very  fe\» 


606  APPENDIJT. 

days  before,  some  of  those  comets,  which  ever  give  token  of  the  ruin 
of  lofty  fortunes,  appeared  in  the  heavens.  Also,  a  short  time  before, 
a  thunderbolt  fell  at  Sirmium,  accompanied  with  a  terrible  clap  of 
thunder,  and  set  fire  to  a  portion  of  the  palace  and  senate-house ;  and 
much  about  the  same  time  an  owl  settled  on  the  top  of  the  royal  baths 
at  Sabaria,  and  pouring  forth  a  funeral  strain  withstood  all  the  at- 
tempts to  slay  it  with  arrows  or  stones." — [xxx. :  5:  15,  16. 

"  After  many  true  prophecies  uttered  by  diviners  and  augurs,  dogs 
were  seen  to  recoil  from  howling  wolves,  and  the  birds  of  night  con 
stantly  uttered  querulous  and  mournful  cries ;  and  lurid  sunrises  made 
the  mornings  dark.  .  .  All  which  circumstances  pointed  out,  almost  as 
in  express  words,  that  the  end  of  the  emperor's  [Valens']  life  was  at 
hand."— [XXXI. :  1:  3,  3. 

XVII.:  p.  296. — "The  augury  by  the  inspection  of  entrails,  for  a 
time  neglected,  though  it  was  the  old  Roman  way  to  inquire  into  the 
future,  now  came  into  frequent  use.  Alexander  Severus  paid  teachers 
to  give  lectures  on  the  subject.  Not  only  the  entrails  of  animals  but 
also  of  men  were  examined,  in  order  to  discover  what  the  future  would 
bring.  The  general  insecurity  of  the  time,  the  dread  of  what  might  be 
coming,  or  the  ambition  which  was  waiting  for  the  death  of  the  Em- 
peror, with  the  hope  of  taking  his  place — all  led  to  it.  The  last 
heathen  emperors  were  particularly  and  passionately  addicted  to  this 
magic  art.  Women  and  children  were  cut  open  alive  in  the  palace  of 
Diocletian's  co-regent,  in  order  to  inspect  their  entrails." — [Uhlhorn: 
"Conflict  of  Christianity";  New  York  ed.,  1870:  p.  317. 

XVIII. :  p.  298. — "  Now  when  Titus  was  come  into  this  [upper]  city, 
he  admired  not  only  some  other  places  of  strength  in  it,  but  particu- 
larly those  strong  towers  which  the  tyrants,  in  their  mad  conduct,  had 
relinquished ;  for  when  he  saw  their  solid  altitude,  and  the  largeness 
of  their  several  stones,  and  the  exactness  of  their  joints,  as  also  how 
gi'eat  was  their  breadth,  and  how  extensive  their  length,  he  expressed 
himself  after  the  manner  following:  '  We  have  certainly  had  God  for 
our  assistant  in  this  war,  and  it  was  no  other  than  God  who  ejected  the 
Jews  out  of  these  fortifications ;  for  what  could  the  hands  of  men,  or 
any  machines,  do  towaixi  overthrowing  these  towers'"  !—[  Joseph  us: 
"  Wars  of  Jews  " ;  Vl. :  9 :  §  1. 

XIX. :  p.  298. — "The  nature  of  such  a  work  [History  of  Prophecy] 
ought  to  be,  that  every  prophecy  of  the  Scripture  be  sorted  with  the 
event  fulfilling  the  same;  .  .  allowing,  nevertheless,  that  latitude 
which  is  agreeable  and  familiar  unto  divine  prophecies ;  being  of  the 
nature  of  their  author,  with  whom  a  thousand  years  are  but  as  one 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  /X.  607 

day;  and  therefore  are  not  fulfilled  punctually  at  once,   but  have 
springing  and   germinant  accomplishment  throughout  many  ages, 
though  the  height  or  fullness  of  them  may  refer  to  some  one  age/' 
— ["Advancement  of  Learning";   Bacon's  Works:  New  York  ed. 
1864:  Vol.  VI.:  pp.  199-200. 

XX. :  p.  299. — "But  what  more  than  all  else  characterized  the  Jew, 
was  his  confident  and  happy  belief  in  a  brilliant  and  happy  future  for 
humanity.  .  .  Hope — what  the  Jew  calls  tiqva — this  assurance  of 
something  which  is  by  no  means  proved,  but  to  which  we  attach  our- 
selves all  the  more  eagerly  because  we  have  no  certainty  of  it — was  the 
veiy  soul  of  the  Jew.  His  Psalms  were  like  one  continuous  harp-note, 
filling  his  life  with  harmony  and  melancholy  faith ;  his  prophets  had 
the  words  of  eternity :  the  second  Isaiah,  for  instance,  the  prophet  of 
the  Captivity,  depicted  the  future  in  the  brightest  colours  that  have 
ever  been  revealed  to  the  dreams  of  man." — [Renan:  "Hibbert  Lec- 
tures": London  ed.,  1880:  pp.  43^4. 

XXI. :  p.  299. — "The  expectation  of  a  Messiah  had  grown  up  among 
tlie  Israelitish  people  long  before  the  time  of  Jesus,  and  just  then  had 
ripened  to  full  maturity.  And  from  its  beginning  this  expectation 
was  not  indefinite,  but  determined  and  characterized  by  many  import- 
ant particulars.  .  .  In  general,  the  whole  Messianic  era  was  expected 
to  be  full  of  signs  and  wonders.  The  eyes  of  the  blind  should  be 
opened,  the  eai's  of  the  deaf  should  be  unclosed,  the  lame  should  leap, 
and  the  tongue  of  the  dumb  praise  God.  These  merely  figurative  expres- 
sions soon  came  to  be  understood  literally,  and  thus  the  idea  of  the 
Messiah  was  continually  filled  up  with  new  details,  even  before  the  ap- 
pearance of  Jesus.  Thus  many  of  the  legends  respecting  him  had  not 
to  be  newly  invented ;  they  already  existed  in  the  popular  hope  of  the 
Messiah."— [Strauss  :  "Life  of  Jesus"  London  ed.,  1846  :  Vol.  I.  : 
pp.  80-81. 

XXII. :  p.  299. — "  This  view  of  Christ's  person  arose  from  the  direct 
impression  which  his  appearance  among  men  made  upon  the  eye-wit- 
nesses, and  through  them  upon  the  whole  human  race.  This  image  of 
Christ,  which  has  always  propagated  itseK  in  the  consciousness  of  the 
Christian  Church,  originated  in,  and  ever  points  back  to,  the  revela- 
tion of  Christ  himself,  without  which,  indeed,  it  could  never  have 
arisen.  As  man's  limited  intellect  could  never,  without  the  aid  of 
revelation,  have  originated  the  idea  of  God,  so  the  image  of  Christ  could 
never  have  sprung  from  the  consciousness  of  sinful  humanity,  but 
must  be  regarded  as  the  reflection  of  the  actual  life  of  such  a  Christ." 
—[Neander  :  "Life  of  Jesus  Christ";  New  York  ed.,  1856  :  p.  3. 


608  APPENDIX. 

XXIII. :  p.  301. — "Afterwards  he  [Celsus]  says,  'If  it  were  possible 
that  all  the  inhabitants  of  Asia,  Europe,  and  Libya,  Greeks  and  Barba 
nans,  were  to  come  under  one  law ' ;  but,  judging  this  quite  impossi 
ble,  he  adds,  '  any  one  who  thinks  this  possible,  knows  nothing. '  I*^ 
would  require  careful  consideration  and  lengthened  argument  to  prova 
that  it  is  not  only  possible,  but  that  it  will  surely  come  to  jiass.  that  aL. 
who  are  endowed  with  reason  shall  come  under  one  law.  The  Stoics 
indeed  hold  that  when  the  strongest  of  the  elements  prevails  all  thing* 
shall  be  turned  into  fire.  But  our  beUef  is  that  the  Word  shall  pre- 
vail over  the  entire  rational  creation,  and  change  every  soul  into  Hit 
own  perfection ;  in  which  state  every  one,  by  the  mere  exercise  of  his 
power,  will  choose  what  he  desires,  and  obtain  what  he  chooses.  For 
although  in  the  diseases  and  wounds  of  the  body  there  are  some  which 
no  medical  skill  can  cure,  yet  we  hold  that  in  the  mind  there  is  no 
evil  so  strong  that  it  may  not  be  overcome  by  the  Supreme  Word  and 
Grod."— [Origen  :  adv.  Celsus  :  viil. :  72. 

XXIV. :  p.  303. — "It  was  given  as  the  chief  and  most  necessary  sign 
of  Hls  coming  [the  Holy  Spirit]  on  those  who  had  believed,  that  every 
one  of  them  spoke  in  the  tongues  of  all  nations ;  thus  signifying  that 
the  unity  of  the  Catholic  Church  would  embrace  all  nations,  and 
would  in  hke  manner  speak  in  all  tongues.  .  .  The  gospel  of  Christ 
w^as  preached  in  the  whole  world,  not  only  by  those  who  had  seen  and 
heard  Him,  but  also  after  their  death  by  their  successors,  amid  the 
horrible  persecutions,  diverse  torments  and  deaths  of  the  martyrs ;  God 
also  bearing  them  witness,  with  signs  and  wonders,  and  divers  mira- 
cles and  gifts  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  that  the  people  of  the  nations,  be-^ 
lieving  in  Him  who  was  crucified  for  their  redemption,  might  venerate 
with  Christian  love  the  blood  of  the  martyi'S  which  they  had  poured 
forth  with  devHish  fury,  and  that  the  very  kings  by  whose  laws  the 
church  had  been  wasted  might  become  profitably  subject  to  that  Name 
which  they  had  cruelly  striven  to  banish  from  the  earth." — [Augus- 
tine :  Civ.  Dei  :  xviil. :  49,  50. 

"  The  sixth  [prophetic  age]  is  now  passing,  and  cannot  be  measured 
by  any  number  of  generations,  as  it  has  been  said,  '  It  is  not  for  you  to 
know  the  times,  which  the  Father  hath  put  in  His  own  power.'  After 
this  period,  God  shall  rest,  as  on  the  seventh  day,  when  He  shall  give 
us  rest  in  Himself.  But  there  is  not  now  space  to  treat  of  these  ages; 
sufiice  it  to  say,  that  the  seventh  shall  be  our  Sabbath,  which  shall  be 
brought  to  a  close  not  by  an  evening,  but  by  the  Lord's  day,  as  an 
eighth,  an  eternal  day.  Then  we  shall  rest  and  see,  see  and  love,  love 
and  praise.  This  is  what  shall  be  in  the  end  without  end." — [dv- 
Dei:  xxii. :  30. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IX.  609 

XXV.:  p.  302. — "As  with  Heraclitus,  so  with  the  Stoics,  it  is  the 
tire-matter,  or  centre  of  vital  heat,  from  which  all  motion  proceeds, 
and  which,  by  virtue  of  its  purity  and  capacity  of  motion,  is  at  the 
same  time  infinite  intelligence.  All  is  either  the  deity  itself,  or  a  form 
adopted  by  it.  .  .  In  the  great  conflagration,  which  takes  place  after 
the  expiration  of  a  world-period  or  'great  year,'  all  organized  beings 
will  be  destroyed,  these  gods  [the  stars,  etc.]  will  disappear,  all  multi- 
plicity and  difference  be  lost  in  God's  unity :  which  means,  all  will  be- 
come ether  again." — [Dollinger  :  "The  Gentile  and  the  Jew " ;  London 
ed.,  1862  :  Vol.  1  :  pp.  350-351. 

The  later  Stoics  were  inclined  to  give  prominence  to  the  element  of 
water  as  the  instrument  of  the  coming  destruction : — 

"But  at  that  time  it  [the  sea]  being  released  from  inile,  shall  be  borne 
abroad  without  measure.  After  what  fashion,  sayest  thou  ?  In  the 
same  way  in  which  the  future  conflagration  is  to  come  to  pass.  Each 
shall  occur  at  such  time  as  it  shall  seem  good  to  God  to  give  beginning 
to  better  things,  and  to  finish  the  old.  Fire  and  water  have  dominion 
over  earthly  things.  From  these  is  the  beginning,  from  these  also  the 
end,  of  all  things.  Whensoever,  then,  new  things  are  pleasing  to  the 
universe,  the  sea  shall  be  sent  from  above  upon  us,  in  like  manner  as 
the  fury  of  fire  when  another  sort  of  end  is  preferred.  .  .  The  ocean 
being  driven  back  from  our  abodes  [at  the  subsidence  of  the  deluge] 
shall  be  thrust  into  his  secret  recesses,  and  the  ancient  order  shall  be 
reestablished.  Every  living  creature  shall  be  generated  anew,  and  a 
race  of  men  unskilled  in  wickedness  shall  be  given  to  the  earth,  a  race 
born  to  better  hopes.  But  even  their  innocence  shall  not  long  endure 
with  them ;  only  while  men  are  still  recent.  Speedily  wickedness  shall 
again  steal  back ;  virtue  is  hard  to  be  found,  she  requires  a  teacher  and 
a  governor.  Even  without  a  master,  vices  are  learned." — [Seneca: 
Natur.  Quaest. :  III. :  28,  30. 

XXVI. :  p.  302. — "  These  two  things,  then,  thou  must  bear  in  mind: 
the  one,  that  all  things  from  eternity  are  of  hke  forms,  and  come 
round  in  a  circle,  and  that  it  makes  no  difference  whether  a  man  shall 
see  the  same  things  during  a  hundred  yeai-s  or  two  hundred,  or  an  in- 
finite time.  .  .  As  it  happens  to  thee  in  the  amphitheatre  and  such 
places,  that  the  continual  sight  of  the  same  things,  and  the  uniformity, 
make  the  spectacle  wearisome,  so  it  is  in  the  whole  of  life ;  for  all  things 
above,  below,  are  the  same,  and  from  the  same.  How  long  then  ?  .  . 
Constantly  consider  how  all  things,  such  as  they  now  are,  ir  time  past 
also  were ;  and  consider  that  they  will  be  the  same  again.  And  place 
before  thine  eyes  entire  dramas  and  stages  of  the  same  form,  whatever 
thou  hast  learned  from  thy  experience,  or  from  older  history:  for  ex- 
ample, the  whole  court  of  Hadrian,  and  the  whole  corrt  of  Anto 
39 


610  appendix:, 

ninus,  and  the  whole  court  of  Philip,  Alexander,  Croesus;  for  all  these 
were  such  dramas  as  we  see  now,  only  with  different  actors."— 
[M.  Aurelius:   "Meditations'':   ll. :  14;  vi. :  46;  X.:  27. 

XXVII. :  p.  302. — Polybius  expressed  the  highest  wisdom  of  his  time 
in  political  philosophy,  when  he  said : — 

"Such  is  the  circle  in  which  political  societies  are  revolved  [Mon- 
archy, Tyranny,  Aristocracy,  Oligarchy,  Democracy  Anarchy,  and 
Monarchy  again],  and  such  the  natural  order  in  which  the  several 
kinds  of  government  are  varied,  till  they  are  at  last  brought  back  to 
that  original  form  from  which  the  progress  was  begun.  With  the  help 
of  being  acquainted  with  these  principles,  though  it  may  not  perhaps 
be  easy  to  foretell  the  exact  time  of  every  alteration  in  a  state,  if  our 
minds  are  free  from  prejudice  and  passion  we  shall  very  rarely  be  de- 
<;eived  in  judging  of  the  degree  of  exaltation  or  decline  in  which  it  sub- 
sists, or  in  declaring  the  form  into  which  it  must  at  last  be  changed." 
—[Gen.  Hist. :  vi. :  Ex.  1. 

XXVIII. :  p.  303. — "And  those  of  the  Stoic  school — since,  so  far  as 
their  moral  teaching  went,  they  were  admirable,  as  were  also  the  poets 
m  some  particulars,  on  account  of  the  seed  of  reason  [the  Logos]  im- 
planted in  every  race  of  men — were,  we  know,  hated  and  put  to  death ; 
Heraclitus,  for  instance,  and  among  those  of  our  own  time  Musonius, 
and  others.  .  .  I  confess  that  I  both  boast,  and  with  all  my  strength 
strive,  to  be  found  a  Christian ;  not  because  the  teachings  of  Plato  are 
different  from  those  of  Christ,  but  because  they  are  not  in  all  respects 
similar,  as  neither  are  those  of  the  others,  stoics,  and  poets,  and  his- 
torians. For  each  man  spoke  well  in  proportion  to  the  share  which  he 
had  of  the  spermatic  [seminal]  Word,  seeing  what  was  related  to  it.  .  . 
Whatever  things  were  rightly  said,  among  all  men,  are  the  property 
of  us  Christians.  .  .  For  all  the  writers  were  able  to  see  realities  darkly, 
through  the  sowing  of  the  implanted  Word  that  was  in  them." — [Jus- 
tin Martyr:  Apology  II. :  viii.,  xm. 

XXIX. :  p.  303. — "  Philosophy  does  not  ruin  life  by  being  the  orig- 
inator of  false  practices  and  base  deeds,  though  some  have  calumniated 
it,  although  it  be  the  clear  image  of  truth,  a  Divine  gift  to  the  Greeks ; 
nor  does  it  drag  us  away  from  the  faith,  as  if  we  were  bewitched  by 
some  delusive  art,  but  rather,  so  to  speak,  by  the  use  of  an  ampler  circuit, 
it  obtains  a  common  exercise,  demonstrative  of  the  faith.  .  .  Before 
the  advent  of  the  Lord,  philosophy  was  necessary  to  the  Greeks  for 
righteousness.  And  now  it  becomes  conducive  to  piety ;  being  a  kind 
of  pi*eparatory  training  to  those  who  attain  to  faith  through  demonstra- 
tion. .  .  Philosophy  was  a  preparation,  paving  the  way  for  him  wlio 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  /X  611 

is  perfected  in  Christ.  .  .  There  Is  then  in  philosophy,  though  stolen 
as  the  fire  by  Prometheus,  a  slender  spark,  capable  of  being  fanned 
into  flame,  a  trace  of  wisdom  and  an  impulse  from  God.  .  .  It  is  evi- 
dent that  the  Apostle  [Paul],  by  availing  himself  of  poetical  examples 
from  the  Phcenomena  of  Aratus,  approves  of  what  had  been  well- 
spoken  by  the  Greeks ;  and  intimates  that,  by  the  unknown  God,  God 
the  Creator  was  in  a  roundabout  way  worshipped  by  the  Greeks ;  but 
that  it  was  necessary  by  positive  knowledge  to  apprehend  and  learn 
Him  through  His  Son."— [Clement  of  Alex.:  "Stromata":  I.:  2,  5, 
17,  19. 

XXX. :  p.  303. — "  For  the  Christians  are  distinguished  from  other 
men  neither  by  country,  nor  language,  nor  the  customs  which  they 
observe.  For  they  neither  inhabit  cities  of  their  own,  nor  employ  a 
peculiar  form  of  speech,  nor  lead  a  life  which  is  marked  out  by  any 
singularity.  .  .  But  inhabiting  Greek  as  well  as  barbarian  cities, 
according  as  the  lot  of  each  of  them  has  determined,  and  following 
the  customs  of  the  natives  in  respect  to  clothing,  food,  and  the  rest  of 
their  ordinary  conduct,  they  display  to  all  their  wonderful  and  con- 
fessedly paradoxical  conduct.  They  dwell  in  their  own  countries,  but 
simply  as  sojourners.  As  citizens  they  share  in  all  things  with  others, 
yet  endure  all  things  as  if  foreignei's.  .  .  They  obey  the  prescribed 
laws,  and  at  the  same  time  surpass  the  laws  by  their  lives.  They  love 
all  men,  and  are  persecuted  by  all.  .  .  To  sum  up  all  in  one  word : 
what  the  soul  is  in  the  body,  that  Christians  are  in  the  world.  The 
soul  is  dispersed  through  all  the  members  of  the  body,  and  Christians 
are  scattered  tlirough  all  the  cities  of  the  world.  The  soul  dwells  in 
the  body,  yet  is  not  of  the  body ;  and  Christians  dwell  in  the  world, 
yet  are  not  of  the  world.  The  invisible  soul  is  guarded  by  the  visible 
body;  and  though  Christians  are  known  indeed  to  be  in  the  world 
their  godliness  remains  invisible.  .  .  The  soul  is  imprisoned  in  the 
body,  yet  preserves  that  very  body ;  and  Christians  are  confined  in  the 
world  as  in  a  prison,  yet  they  are  the  preservers  of  the  world.  .  .  God 
has  assigned  them  this  illustrious  position,  which  it  were  unlawful  for 
them  to  forsake." — [Ep.  to  Diognetus  :  v.,  vi. 

XXXI.:  p.  304. — "I  saw  a  golden  ladder,  of  marvellous  height, 
reaching  up  even  to  heaven,  and  very  narrow,  so  that  persons  could 
only  ascend  it  one  by  one ;  and  on  the  sides  of  the  ladder  was  fixed 
every  kind  of  iron  weapon.  There  were  swords,  lances,  hooks,  dag- 
ger!s ;  so  that  if  any  one  went  up  carelessly,  or  not  looking  upwards, 
he  would  be  torn  to  pieces,  and  his  flesh  would  cleave  to  the  iron 
weapons.  And  under  the  ladder  was  crouching  a  dragon  of  wonderful 
size,  who  lay  in  wait  for  those  who  ascended,  and  frightened  them 


612  APPENDIX. 

from  the  ascent.  .  .  And  I  went  up,  and  I  saw  an  inunense  extent  ol 
garden,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  garden  a  white-haired  man  sitting  in 
the  dress  of  a  shepherd,  of  large  stature,  milking  sheep ;  and  standing 
around  were  many  thousand  white-robed  ones.  And  he  raised  his  head, 
and  looked  upon  me,  and  said  to  me,  '  Thou  art  welcome,  Daughter.'  '* 
— ["  Pass,  of  Perpetua  and  Felicitas  " :  I. :  3. 

XXXn. :  p.  304.—''  In  January,  a.d.  250,  St.  Fabian  fell  a  victim  to 
the  persecution  of  Decius.  And  a  few  years  later,  a.d.  257,  there  was 
published  the  first  imperial  edict  that  we  kno^v  of  which  interfered 
with  the  liberty  of  the  Christians  in  their  use  of  the  catacombs.  The 
edict  itself  has  not  been  preserved,  but  from  the  language  of  two  con- 
temporary authors  we  can  almost  restore  its  very  words.  It  distinctly 
forbade  '  all  Christian  assemblies,  and  all  visits  to  the  places  called 
cemeteries,'  and  threatened  the  severest  pmiishment  upon  any  who 
should  disobey.  .  .  On  one  occasion,  when  a  great  number  of  the 
faithful  had  been  seen  entering  the  subterranean  crypt  to  visit  their 
tombs,  the  entrance  was  hastily  built  up,  and  a  vast  mound  of  sand 
and  stones  heaped  in  front  of  it,  that  they  might  be  all  buried  alive, 
even  as  the  martyrs  whom  they  had  come  to  venerate." — ["Roma 
Sotterranea  " ;  London  ed.,  1879:  Part  First:  pp.  150,  155. 

XXXIII. :  p.  304. — "  No  one  has  been  able  to  introduce  and  make 
known  what  seemed  to  him  the  truth,  I  do  not  say  among  many  for- 
eign nations,  but  even  amongst  the  individuals  of  one  siugle  nation, 
in  such  manner  that  the  knowledge  and  belief  of  the  same  should  ex- 
tend to  all.  .  .  And  yet  there  are  throughout  the  whole  world — 
throughout  aU  Greece,  and  all  foreign  countries — countless  individuals 
who  have  abandoned  the  laws  of  their  country,  and  those  whom  they 
had  believed  to  be  gods,  and  have  yielded  themselves  up  to  the  obedi- 
ence of  the  law  of  Moses,  and  to  the  discipleship  and  worship  of  Christ ; 
and  have  done  this  not  without  exciting  against  themselves  the  intense 
hatred  of  the  worshippers  of  images,  so  as  frequently  to  be  exposed  to 
cruel  tortures,  and  sometimes  even  to  be  put  to  death.  Yet  they  em- 
brace, and  with  all  affection  preserve,  the  words  and  teaching  of 
Christ.  .  .  From  which  it  is  no  doubtful  inference,  that  it  is  not  by 
human  power  or  might  that  the  words  of  Jesus  Christ  come  to  prevail 
with  all  faith  and  power  over  the  understandmgs  and  souls  of  all 
men." — [Origen:  De  Princip.  (Rufinus' trans.) :  iv. :  1,  2. 

"We  have  to  say,  moreover,  that  the  Gospel  has  a  demonstration  of 
its  own,  more  divine  than  any  established  by  Grecian  dialectics.  And 
this  diviner  method  is  called  by  the  apostle  '  the  manifestation  of  the 
Spirit  and  of  power.'  .  .  And  although  I  have  previously  mentioned 
a  Grospel  declaration  uttered  by  the  Saviour,  I  shall  nevertheless  quote 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IX.  -     613 

it  again,  as  it  confirms  both  the  divine  manifestation  of  our  Saviour's 
foreknowledge  regarding  the  preaching  of  His  gospel,  and  the  power 
of  His  word,  which,  without  the  aid  of  teachers,  gains  the  mastery 
over  those  who  yield  their  assent  to  persuasion  accompanied  with  di- 
vine power ;  and  the  words  of  Jesus  referred  to  are,  '  The  harvest  ia 
plenteous,  but  the  labourers  are  few;  pray  ye  therefore  the  Lord  of  the 
harvest  that  He  will  send  forth  labourers  into  His  harvest.' " — [Origen 
adv.  Celsus:  L:  2,  62. 

XXXIV. :  p.  305.—"  The  books  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  were  found, 
and  they  were  committed  to  the  flames ;  the  utensils  and  furniture  of 
the  church  were  abandoned  to  pillage  ;  all  was  rapine,  confusion,  tu- 
mult. .  .  Presbytera  and  other  officers  of  the  church  were  seized, 
without  evidence  by  witnesses  or  confession,  condemned,  and  together 
with  their  families  led  to  execution.  In  burning  alive,  no  distmction 
of  sex  or  age  was  regarded ;  and  because  of  their  great  multitude,  they 
were  not  burned  one  after  another,  but  a  herd  of  them  were  encircled 
by  the  same  fire ;  and  servants,  having  millstones  tied  about  their 
necks,  were  cast  into  the  sea.  .  .  He  [Galerius]  began  this  mode  of 
execution  by  edicts  against  the  Christians,  commanding  that  after  tor- 
ture and  condemnation  they  should  be  burned  at  a  slow  fire.  They 
were  fixed  to  a  stake,  and  first  moderate  flame  was  applied  to  the  soles 
of  their  feet,  until  the  muscles,  contracted  by  burning,  were  torn  from 
the  bones ;  then  torches,  lighted  and  put  out  again,  were  directed  to  all 
the  members  of  their  bodies,  so  that  no  part  had  any  exemption; 
Meanwhile,  cold  water  was  continually  poured  on  their  faces,  and 
their  mouths  moistened,  lest,  by  reason  of  their  jaws  being  parched, 
they  should  expire.  At  length  they  did  expire,  when,  after  many 
hours,  the  violent  heat  had  consumed  their  skin,  and  penetrated  into 
their  intestines.  .  .  And  now,  when  G-alerius  was  m  the  eighteenth 
year  of  his  reign,  God  struck  him  with  an  incurable  plague.  .  .  He 
grew  emaciated,  pallid,  and  feeble,  and  the  bleeding  then  staunched. 
The  ulcer  began  to  be  insensible  to  the  remedies  applied,  and  a  gan- 
grene seized  all  the  neighbouring  parts.  It  diffused  itself  the  wider, 
the  more  the  cori-upted  flesh  was  cut  away.  .  .  The  humors  having 
been  repelled,  the  distemper  attacked  his  intestines,  and  worms  were 
generated  in  his  body.  The  stench  was  so  foul  as  to  pervade  not  only 
the  palace,  but  even  the  whole  city.  .  .  At  length,  overcome  by  ca- 
lamities, he  was  obliged  to  acknowledge  God,  and  he  cried  aloud,  in 
the  intervals  of  raging  pain,  that  he  would  re-edify  the  Church  which 
he  had  demolished,  and  make  atonement  for  his  misdeeds ;  and  when 
he  was  near  his  end  he  published  an  edict  of  the  tenor  following:  .  . 
*  We,  from  our  wonted  clemency,  have  judged  it  fit  to  extend  our  ui- 
dulgence  to  those  men,  and  to  permit  them  again  to  be  Christians,  and 


614  APPENDIX. 

to  establish  the  places  of  their  religious  assemblies.  .  .  Wherefore,  ii 
will  be  the  duty  of  the  Christians,  in  consequence  of  this  our  tolera- 
tion, to  pray  to  their  God  for  our  welfare,  and  for  that  of  the  public^ 
and  for  their  own." — ["  De  Mort.  Persecut." :  xii.,  xv.,  xxi.,  xxxm-iv. 
If  this  treatise  was  by  Lactantius,  to  whom  it  is  commonly  and 
probably  ascribed,  it  has  a  peculiar  interest  and  importance,  not  only 
as  giving  the  testimony  of  an  eye-witness  to  the  events  recorded,  but 
as  showing  under  what  influences  the  eloquent  and  famous  Pagan 
professor  was  himself  converted  into  the  fervent  Christian  disciple. 

XXXV. :  p.  305. — "  Indeed,  the  armed  soldiery  surrounded  a  Chris- 
tian town  in  Phrygia,  together  with  the  garrison,  and  hurling  fire  inta 
it  burnt  them,  together  with  women  and  children,  calling  upon  Christ 
the  God  of  all.  And  this,  because  all  the  inhabitants  of  this  town, 
even  the  very  governor  and  magistrate,  with  all  the  men  of  rank,  and 
the  whole  people,  confessed  themselves  Christians,  and  would  not  in. 
any  degree  obey  those  who  commanded  them  to  offer  sacrifice." — 
[Eusebius:  Eccl.  Hist.:  viii. :  11. 

XXXVI. :  p.  305. — "  It  is  a  fundamental  human  right,  a  privilege 
of  nature,  that  every  man  should  worship  according  to  his  o^vn  con- 
victions :  one  man's  religion  neither  harms  nor  helps  another  man.  It 
is  assuredly  no  part  of  reUgion  to  compel  religion — to  which  free  will 
and  not  force  should  lead  us — the  sacrificial  victims  even  being  re- 
quired of  a  willing  mind.  You  will  render  no  real  service  to  your 
gods  by  compelling  us  to  sacrifice.  For  they  can  have  no  desire  of 
offerings  from  the  unwilling,  unless  they  are  animated  by  a  spirit  of 
contention,  which  is  a  thing  altogether  undivine." — [Tertullian  :  Ad 
Scapul. :  II. 

* '  For  see  that  you  do  not  give  a  further  ground  for  the  charge  of 
irreligion,  by  taking  away  religious  liberty,  and  forbidding  free  choice 
of  deity,  so  that  I  may  no  longer  worship  according  to  my  inclination, 
but  am  compelled  to  worship  against  it.  .  .  But  with  you  liberty  is 
given  to  worship  any  god  but  the  true  God,  as  though  He  were  not 
rather  the  God  whom  all  should  worship,  to  whom  all  belong." — 
[Tertullian :  Apologet. :  xxiv. 

XXXVII. :  p.  305. — The  jubilant  feeling  of  the  time  seems  to  roll  in 
resounding  echo  through  the  noble  lines  of  Mrs.  Alexander : — 

"  Then  souls  of  men  were  shaken  with  emotions  new  and  strange, 
And  creeds  and  thoughts  were  tossing  in  an  agony  of  change. 
The  world,  that  had  grown  weary  of  its  pleasures  and  its  gains, 
Felt  a  tide  of  yonth  and  rapture  rush  through  its  wasted  veins, 
And  life  it  never  knew  before  was  stirring  to  its  core 
The  proud  and  puissant  empire  that  was  '  pagan  Rome  '  no  more. 


NOT^S  TO  LECTURE  IX,  615 

The  seed  that  was  so  small  had  grown  a  tree  that  flourished  grand* 
The  leaven  in  the  woman's  cake  had  leavened  all  the  land. 
Where  silver  Jordan  runneth  Irom  the  Lake  of  Galilee, 
A  narrow  kingdom  lies  between  the  mountains  and  the  sea  ; 
From  its  hill-sides  red  with  vineyards,  the  gentle  Syrian  wind 
Bore  the  only  voice  that  answered  to  the  sobbing  of  mankind. 
To  the  cottage  of  the  fisher,  to  the  poor  man's  mean  abode, 
The  '  Desire  of  Nations  '  came,  the  Incarnate  Son  of  God. 
The  sign  that  was  a  sign  of  shame  to  pagan  and  to  Jew, 
Had  become  an  image  glorious,  that  all  men  flocked  unto  ; 
The  martyr  at  the  stake  for  this  esteemed  the  world  but  loss, 
The  Emperor  victorious  won  his  battles  in  the  Cross  !" 

[Cecil  Frances  Alexander:  "  Contemporary  Eeview": 
Vol.  IV. :  pp.  176-7. 

XXXVni. :  p.  305.—"  The  Gospel,  preached  by  men  without  name, 
without  study,  without  eloquence,  cruelly  persecuted,  and  destitute  oi 
all  human  support,  did  not  fail  to  get  established  in  a  short  time 
throughout  the  whole  world.  It  is  a  fact  which  nobody  can  deny,  and 
a  fact  wliich  proves  that  the  work  was  of  God."— [Bayle:  "Diet.  His- 
torique";  Art.  "Mahomet":  Eem.  O. ;  Paris  ed. ,  1820 ;  Tom.  X. :  p.  67. 

"It  is  a  very  astonishing  spectacle,  the  triumph  of  the  Christian  re- 
ligion, and  the  downfall  of  Paganism,  after  a  contest  which  held  the 
attention  of  the  world  for  three  hundred  years.  That  twelve  men, 
born  in  the  midst  of  the  lowest  condition,  among  a  people  hated  by  all 
nations,  should  have  undertaken  to  change -the  face  of  the  world,  to 
refashion  its  beliefs  and  its  manners,  to  abolish  the  superstitious  wor- 
ships which  had  everywhere  entwined  themselves  with  political  insti- 
tutions, to  subject  to  one  and  the  same  law,  hostile  to  all  the  passions, 
both  sovereigns  and  their  subjects,  slaves  and  their  masters,  the  noble 
and  the  lowly,  the  rich  and  the  poor,  the  instructed  and  the  ignorant ; 
to  do  this  with  no  support,  either  of  force,  or  of  eloquence,  or  of  argu- 
mentative discussion,  but  on  the  contrary  in  spite  of  the  violent  oppo- 
sition of  everything  which  possessed  any  power  to  oppose,  in  spite  of 
the  pei-secutions  of  emperors  and  magistrates,  of  the  interested  resist- 
ance of  idol-priests,  of  the  railings  and  the  contempt  of  philosophers, 
of  the  frenzy  of  fanaticism ;  that  these  men,  by  exhibiting  to  the  na- 
tions the  instrument  of  an  infamous  punishment,  should  have  con- 
quered alike  the  fanaticism  of  the  mob,  the  philosophers  and  the  priests, 
the  magistrates  and  the  emperors ;  that  the  cross  should  have  been  ex- 
alted upon  the  palace  of  the  Caesars,  from  which  had  gone  so  many 
bloody  edicts  against  the  disciples  of  Christ,  and  that  by  suffering  and 
by  dying  these  men  should  have  thus  overcome  all  human  powers, — it 
is  a  fact  unique  in  history  ;  a  marvellous  fact,  which  strikes  one  in- 
stantly as  a  vast  and  evident  exception  to  all  which  we  know  X)f  man. 
.   .   Divine  in  its  establishment,  divine  in  its  effects,  the  Christian  re 


616  APFMNDIJ[. 

ligioti  possesses  all  those  marks  of  truth  which  impose  the  obligation 
to  accept  it  on  those  to  whose  knowledge  it  has  been  brought." — [La 
Mennais:  "Essaisur  rindifference  " ;  CEuvres:  Paris  ed.,  1823:  Tom. 
IV. :  pp.  451-2,  481. 

When  he  wrote  as  above,  La  Mennais  was  a  devout  priest  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  Church  ;  but  Rousseau  before  him  had  written  in 
much  the  same  vein,  and  under  similar  impressions  from  the  extraordi- 
nary history : — 

"After  the  death  of  Jesus  Christ,  twelve  poor  fishermen  and  me- 
chanics undertook  to  instruct  and  to  convert  the  world.  Their  method 
was  simple ;  they  preached  without  art,  but  with  hearts  deeply  moved ; 
and  of  all  the  miracles  with  which  God  honored  their  faith  the  most 
stri]ang  was  the  saintliness  of  their  life.  Their  disciples  followed  their 
example,  and  their  success  was  prodigious.  The  pagan  priests,  be- 
coming alarmed,  made  princes  understand  that  the  State  was  in  danger, 
since  the  offerings  were  diminished.  Persecutions  arose,  and  the  per- 
secutors only  availed  to  hasten  the  progress  of  that  religion  which 
they  sought  to  extinguish.  All  Christians  rushed  to  martyrdom,  all 
peoples  rushed  to  baptism.  The  history  of  those  firet  centuries  is  a 
continual  prodigy." — [CEuvres:  Paris  ed.,  1793;  "Melanges":  Tom. 
IV. :  p.  262. 

"Mahomet  established  himself  by  killing,  Jesus  Christ  by  causing 
his  own  friends  to  be  killed;  Mahomet,  by  forbidding  to  read;  Jesus 
Christ,  by  commanding  to  read.  In  fine,  the  methods  are  so  opposite 
that  if  Mahomet  has  taken  the  way  to  succeed,  humanly  judging,  Je- 
sus Christ  has  taken  the  way  to  perish,  on  any  human  calculation. 
And  in  place  of  concluding  that  because  Mahomet  succeeded,  Jesus 
Christ  was  well  able  to  succeed,  it  ought  to  be  said  that  since  Mahomet 
has  succeeded,  Christianity  must  have  perished  if  it  had  not  been  sus- 
tained by  a  wholly  Divine  force." — [Pascal:  Pensees;  Paris  ed.,  1878: 
Sec.  Par. ;  Art.  XII. :  10. 

XXXIX.:  p.  305. — "A  calumnious  accusation  was  made  against 
Athanasius  the  bishop,  the  emperor  being  assured  that  he  was  intent 
on  desolating  not  that  city  only,  but  all  Egypt,  and  that  nothing  but 
his  expulsion  out  of  the  country  could  save  it.  The  governor  of  Alex 
andria  was  therefore  instructed  by  an  imperial  edict  to  apprehend  him. 
But  he  fled  again,  saying  to  his  friends,  '  Let  us  retire  for  a  little  while ; 
it  is  but  a  small  cloud  which  will  soon  pass  away.' " — [Socrates  :  Hist. 
Eccl. :  m. :  13-14. 

XL. :  p.  305. — ' '  Romeliaving  been  stormed  and  sacked  by  the  Goths, 
under  Alaric  their  king,  the  worshippers  of  false  gods  made  an  attempt 
to  attribute  this  calamity  to  the  Christian  religion,  and  began  to  blas- 
pheme the  ti'ue  God  with  even  more  than  their  wonted  bittemesp.  and 


J^OmS  TO  LECTURE  IJT.  617 

ascerbity.  It  was  tliis  which  kindled  my  zeal  for  the  house  of  God,  and 
prompted  me  to  undertake  the  defence  of  the  City  of  God  against  th« 
charges  and  misrepresentations  of  its  assailants." — [Augustine:  "Re- 
tractations": II.:  43. 

XLI. :  p.  307. — "  Anskar  was  born  in  801.  His  pious  mother  strove 
to  bring  him  up  in  the  nurture  and  admonition  of  the  Lord.  At  an 
early  age  he  was  sent  for  education  to  the  monastery  of  Corbie,  which 
was  then  in  high  repute,  both  for  the  piety  and  the  learning  of  iU 
iQonks.  What  progress  Anskar  made  in  learning,  we  have  no  means 
of  ascertaining ;  but  during  a  long  life  of  labor  and  hardship  he  gave 
evidence  of  fervent  and  intelligent  piety.  .  .  Ascetic  as  he  was,  con- 
stitutionally and  educationally,  and  over-estimating,  as  he  did  all  his 
days,  the  virtue  of  wearing  a  hair-cloth  shirt,  by  night  and  day,  there 
was  a  practical  element  in  his  devotion  which  is  often  wanting  in 
that  of  the  ascetic.  His  enthusiastic  mind  glowed  with  the  ambition 
of  preaching  the  gospel  to  the  heathen,  and  haply  gaining  even  the 
supreme  honor  of  the  martyr's  crown.  .  .  His  life  had  been  from  the 
first  a  life  of  labor,  and  it  was  so  to  the  end.  It  was  from  begin- 
ning to  end  a  life  of  faith,  a  life  of  prayer,  a  life  of  devoted  and 
single-hearted  service  of  God,  a  life  of  disinterested  beneficence  toward 
man.  In  those  rude  days  it  might  be  expected  that  such  a  man  should 
be  credited  with  miraculous  powere.  But  he  ever  declared  that  he 
sought  for  and  knew  of  no  greater  miracle  than  this,  that  the  grace  of 
God  should  make  of  Anskar  a  good  man.  At  last,  in  his  sixty-fourth 
year,  he  entered  into  his  rest.  His  last  words  were  :  '  Lord,  be  merci- 
ful to  me  a  sinner!  Into  Thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit.'" — [Dr. 
T.  Smith:  *' Mediaeval  Missions";  Edinburgh  ed.,  1880:  pp.  124-6, 138. 

XLII. :  p.  307. — "St.  Imier  heard  the  bells  of  the  monastery  which 
was  one  day  to  replace  his  hermitage  echoing  through  the  night. 
*Dear  bix)ther,'  he  said  to  his  only  companion,  'dost  thou  hear  that 
distant  bell  that  has  already  waked  me  three  times  ? '  '  No,'  said  the 
servant.  But  Imier  rose,  and  allowed  himself  to  be  guided  by  this 
mysterious  sound  across  the  high  plateau  and  narrow  gorges  of  the 
valley  of  Doubs,  as  far  as  the  gushing  fountain  where  he  established 
himself,  and  which  has  retained  his  name  to  the  present  time."  (The 
town  of  St.  Imier  is  at  the  present  time  one  of  the  most  flourishing 
centres  of  watch -making  m  the  Bernese  Jura.)  —  [Montalembert : 
"Monks  of  the  West";  London  ed.,  1861  :  Vol.  2  :  pp.  324-5. 

XLIII. :  p.  307. — "  Roger  de  Hautrive,  the  senior  monk,  went  into 
the  Vexin  to  take  possession  of  the  domain  which  the  wounded  knight 
gave  to  St.  Evroult,  as  I  have  related,  but  he  found  the  land  uncul- 
tivated, and  almost  a  desert.     In  the  first  place  he  erected  an  oratorj 


618  APPENDIX, 

with  boughs  of  trees,  m  honor  of  St.  Nicholas.  .  .  It  often  happened 
in  the  night  that  while  Roger  de  Hautrive,  as  he  himself  used  to  relate, 
was  singing  matms  in  his  chapel  of  boughs,  a  wolf  took  his  station 
without,  and  as  it  were  responded  to  the  chant  with  his  bowlings. 
There  he  labored,  until  he  had  brought  under  cultivation  the  land 
which  for  a  long  season  had  been  deserted,  on  account  of  the  war  and 
other  calamities ;  and  there  Roger  de  Sap,  after  some  years  succeeding 
the  former  senior  monk,  began  the  building  of  a  church  of  stone." — 
[Ordericus  Vitalis  :  III. :  12. 

XLIV. :  p.  308. — "The  richest  districts  of  France  trace  their  pros- 
perity to  this  origin ;  witness,  amongst  a  thousand  other  places,  that 
portion  of  La  Brie,  between  Meaux  and  Jouarre,  once  covered  by  a 
vast  forest,  the  fii'st  inhabitant  of  which  was  the  Irish  monk  Fiacre, 
whose  name  still  continues  popular,  and  whom  our  gardeners  honor  as 
their  patron  saint,  probably  without  knowing  anything  whatever  of 
his  history.  .  .  It  is  pleasant  to  appeal  to  more  certain  witnesses  by 
following  upon  our  modern  maps  the  traces  of  monastic  labor 
through  the  forests  of  ancient  France,  and  by  observing  a  multitude  of 
localities,  the  mere  names  of  which  indicate  wooded  districts  evidently 
transformed  into  fields  and  plains  by  the  monks.  .  .  It  was  natural 
that  it  [the  plough]  should  be  the  principal  instrument  of  monastic  cul- 
ture ;  and  it  may  be  said,  without  exaggeration,  that  it  formed,  along 
with  the  cross  of  the  Redeemer,  the  ensign  and  emblazonry  of  the  en- 
tire history  of  the  monks  during  these  early  ages.  Cruce  et  Aratro  ' 
.  .  It  seems  to  me  that  we  should  all  contemplate  with  emotion,  if  il 
stiU  existed,  that  monk's  plough,  [Theodulph's],  doubly  sacred,  by  re- 
ligion and  by  labor,  by  history  and  by  virtue.  For  myself,  I  feel  that 
I  should  kiss  it  as  willingly  as  the  sword  of  Charlemagne  or  the  pen  of 
Bossuet."— [Montalembert:  "  Monks  of  the  West " ;  London  ed.,  1861 : 
Vol.  2:  pp.  376-9. 

' '  Of  the  Anglo-Saxon  husbandry  we  may  remark  that  Domesday 
Survey  gives  us  some  indications  that  the  cultivation  of  the  church 
lands  was  much  superior  to  that  of  any  other  order  of  society.  Tliey 
have  much  less  wood  upon  them,  and  less  common  of  pasture ;  and 
what  they  had  appears  often  in  smaller  and  more  irregular  pieces; 
while  their  meadow  was  more  abundant,  and  in  more  numerous  dis- 
tributions."— [Sharon Turner:  "  Hist,  of  Anglo-Saxons " ;  London  ed., 
1852:  Vol.  2:  p.  478. 

XLV. :  p.  308. — **In  the  year  of  our  Lord  565,  there  came  into 
Britam  a  famous  priest  and  abbot,  a  monk  by  habit  and  life,  whose 
name  was  Columba,  to  preach  the  word  of  G-od  to  the  provinces  of  the 
northern  Picts,  who  are  separated  from  the  southern  parts  by  steep 


SOTJES  TO  LECTURE  IX.  619 

and  rugged  mountains ;  .  .  and  he  converted  tliat  nation  to  the  faith 
of  Christ,  by  his  preaching  and  example.  .  .  Before  he  passed  over  into 
Britain,  he  had  built  a  noble  monastery  in  Ireland,  which,  from  the 
great  number  of  oaks,  is  in  the  Scottish  tongue  called  Deami-ack — the 
Field  of  Oaks.  From  both  which  monasteries  many  others  had  their 
beginning,  through  his  disciples,  both  in  Britain  and  Ireland."— [Bede: 
Hist.  Eccles. ;  III. :  4. 

"Like  twenty  other  saints  of  the  Irish  calendar,  Columba  bore  a 
symbolical  name  borrowed  from  the  Latin,  a  name  which  signified  the 
dove  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  .  .  Columba  was  not  only  himself  a  poet,  but 
he  lived  always  in  great  and  affectionate  sympathy  with  the  bards 
who  at  that  time  occupied  so  high  a  place  in  the  social  and  political 
institutions  of  Ireland.  .  .  To  Columba  was  to  fall  the  honour  of  in- 
troducing civilization  into  the  stony,  sterile,  and  icy  Escosse  la  Sau- 
vage,  which  the  imagination  of  our  fathers  made  the  dwelling-place  of 
hunger,  and  of  the  prince  of  demons.  .  .  The  monastic  apostle  of  Cal- 
edonia, apart  from  the  prevailing  efficacy  of  his  prayers,  had  made  an 
attentive  study  of  the  winds  and  of  all  the  phenomena  of  nature  which 
affected  the  Hves  of  the  insular  and  maritime  people  whom  he  sought 
to  lead  into  Christianity.  A  hundred  different  narratives  represent 
him  to  us  as  the  Eolus  of  those  fabulous  times  and  dangerous  seas." — 
[Montalembert:  "Monks  of  the  West";  London  ed.,  1867:  Vol.  IIL : 
pp.  99,  114,  138,  230. 

' '  We  are  probably  safe  in  asserting  that  for  two  centuries  or  more 
lona  was  the  place  in  all  the  world  whence  the  greatest  amount  of 
evangelistic  influence  went  forth,  and  on  which,  therefore,  the  greatest 
amount  of  blessing  from  on  high  rested.  .  .  It  is  beyond  question  that 
under  the  ministrations  of  the  '  family  of  lona '  the  Pictish  nation  were 
reclaimed  from  barbarism  to  civilization,  and  converted  from  heathen- 
ism to  Christianity.  And  it  is  very  worthy  of  notice  that  in  this  mis- 
sion, while  the  results  were  national,  the  processes  were  individual.  .  . 
As  an  observant  sailor,  he  [Columba]  was  weather-wise.  With  the 
practised  eye  and  loving  heart  of  a  naturalist,  he  gained  a  knowledge 
of  the  habits  of  all  the  creatures  of  earth  and  air,  and  by  the  very  po- 
tency of  love  he  went  far  to  regain  that  dominion  over  the  inferior 
creation  which  was  originally  given  to  sinless  man.  .-.  Let  me,  a 
Scotsman,  addressing  a  Scottish  audience,  say  that  we  have  a  noble 
heritage  in  the  name  and  memory  of  Columba  :  a  heritage  which 
entails  on  us  the  duty  of  generous  emulation ;  a  shield  blazoned  in  all 
its  quarterings  with  mspiriting  devices." — [Dr.  T.  Smith:  "Mediaeval 
Missions";  Edinburgh  ed.,  1880:  pp.  50,  55. 

XLYI. :  p.  308. — "Having  said  thus  much,  he  passed  the  day  joy- 
fully till  the  evening;  and  the  boy  above  mentioned  said,  'Dear  Mas 


620  APPENDIX. 

ter,  there  is  yet  one  sentence  not  written '  [in  the  translation  of  th« 
Gospel  of  St.  John.]  He  answered,  '  Write  quickly.'  Soon  after,  theooy 
said,  'It  is  finished.'  He  replied,  'It  is  well;  you  have  said  the  truth. 
It  is  finished  !  Receive  my  head  into  your  hands ;  for  it  is  a  gi'eat  sat- 
isfaction to  me  to  sit  facing  my  holy  place,  where  I  was  wont  to  pray, 
that  I  may  even  sitting  call  upon  my  Father.'  And  thus,  on  the  pavement 
of  his  little  cell,  singing  '  Glory  be  to  the  Father,  and  to  the  Son,  and 
to  the  Holy  Ghost,'  when  he  had  named  the  Holy  Ghost  he  breathed 
his  last,  and  so  departed  to  the  Heavenly  Kingdom." — [Cuthbert: 
Epist.  de  Obit.  Bedae. 

XLVn. :  p.  309. — "The  end  of  so  sad  a  world  was  at  once  the  hope 
and  the  terror  of  the  Middle  Age.  See  the  old  statues  in  the  cathedrals 
of  the  tenth  and  eleventh  centuries,  meagre,  dumb,  grimacing  in  their 
shrunken  stiffness,  with  the  look  of  suffering  life,  yet  unsightly  as 
death!  See  how  they  implore,  with  clasped  hands,  the  moment  at 
once  desired  and  dreaded,  the  second  death  of  the  resurrection,  which 
will  put  an  end  to  their  unspeakable  sorrows,  and  make  them  pass  out 
of  nothingness  into  being,  out  of  the  tomb  unto  God !  It  is  the  image 
of  the  poor  world ;  hopeless  after  so  many  desolations.  .  .  This  fright- 
ful hope  of  the  final  Judgment  took  additional  force  from  the  calamities 
which  preceded  the  year  1000,  or  which  closely  followed  it.  It  seemed 
as  if  the  order  of  the  seasons  were  inverted,  and  the  elements  were  fol- 
lowing novel  laws.  A  terrible  pestilence  devastated  Aquitaine;  the 
flesh  of  the  sick  seemed  stricken  by  fire,  it  detached  itself  from  their 
bones,  and  fell  in  rottenness.  .  .  It  was  still  worse,  a  few  years  later. 
Famine  ravaged  all  the  world,  this  side  of  the  East;  Greece,  Italy, 
France,  England.  'The  muid  of  com,'  says  a  contemporary,  'rose  to 
sixty  gold  sous.  The  rich  grew  lean  and  pale;  the  poor  ate  forest 
roots ;  many,  horrible  to  tell,  were  left  to  devour  human  flesh.  Along 
the  roads,  the  strong  seized  the  weak,  tore  them  in  pieces,  roasted,  and 
devoured  them.'  .  .  It  was  under  the  good  King  Robert  that  this  ter- 
rible epoch  of  the  year  1000  passed  away ;  and  it  seemed  as  if  the  Divine 
anger  had  been  disarmed  by  this  simple-hearted  man,  in  whom  the 
Peace  of  God  was  as  it  were  incarnate.  Human  nature  took  courage,  and 
hoped  to  endure  a  little  longer.  It  raised  itself  from  its  death-struggle, 
and  began  again  to  live,  to  labor,  to  build;  to  buHd,  flrst  of  all,  the 
churches  of  God.  'After  the  three  years  following  the  year  1000,' 
says  Glaber,  'in  all  the  world,  especially  in  Italy  and  in  Gaul,  the 
basihcas  of  the  churches  were  renovated,  though  for  the  most  part  they 
were  already  so  beautiful  as  to  need  no  such  care.  Nevertheless,  the 
Christian  peoples  seemed  to  rival  each  other  as  to  which  should  build 
them  most  magnificently.  One  might  say  that  the  world  shook  oft 
and  flung  aside  its  old  age,  to  robe  itself  again  in  the  white  raimenc  of 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  IZ.  621 

the  churches.'"— [Michelet :    "Histoire  de  France";  Paris  ed.^  1855; 
Tom.  II. :  pp.  133-6,  144. 

XLVIII. :  p.  312.—"  'Plantations,'  replied  the  [General]  Court,  'are 
above  the  rank  of  an  ordinary  corporation ;  they  have  been  esteemed 
other  than  towns,  yea,  than  many  cities.  Colonies  are  the  foundations 
of  great  Commonwealths.  It  is  the  fruit  of  pride  and  folly  to  despise 
the  day  of  smaU  things."  [a.d.  1646].— [See  Bancroft :  "History  of 
United  States";  Boston  ed.,  1838  :  Vol.  1 :  p.  441. 

"Lastly,  (and  which  was  not  least,)  a  great  hope  &  inward  zeall 
they  [the  pilgrims  from  Holland]  had,  of  laying  some  good  foundation, 
or  at  least  to  make  some  way  thereunto,  for  y^  propagating  &  advanc- 
ing y «  gospell  of  y "  kingdom  of  Christ  in  those  remote  parts  of  y ^  world : 
yea,  though  they  should  be  but  even  as  stepping-stones  unto  others  for 
y*"  performing  of  so  great  a  work.  .  .  What  could  they  see  but  a  hid- 
ious  &  desolate  wilderness,  full  of  wild  beasts  &  willd  men  ?  and  what 
multituds  ther  might  be  of  them  they  knew  not.  Nether  could 
they,  as  it  were,  goe  up  to  y*  tope  of  Pisgah,  to  vew  from  this  willder- 
nes  a  more  goodlie  cuntrie  to  feed  their  hops;  for  which  way  so- 
ever they  turnd  their  eys  (save  upward  to  y^  heavens)  they  could  have 
little  solace  or  content  in  respecte  of  any  outward  objects,  [a.d.  1620.] 
.  .  Thus  out  of  smalle  beginings  greater  things  have  been  prodused  by 
his  hand  y*  made  all  things  of  nothing,  and  gives  being  to  all  things 
that  are ;  and  as  one  small  candle  may  light  a  thousand,  so  y^  light 
here  kindled  hath  shone  to  many,  yea  in  some  sorte  to  our  whole 
nation ;  let  y^  glorious  name  of  Jehova  have  all  y^  praise."  [a.d.  1630.] 
—[Gov.  Bradford:  "Of  Plimoth  Plantation";  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.  ed., 
1856  :  pp.  24,  78,  279. 

XLIX. :  p.  314. — "  The  universal  office  of  all  law  may  then  be  refer- 
red simply  to  the  moral  determination  of  human  nature,  [the  defining 
of  the  invisible  boundary  within  which  the  existence  and  activity  of 
each  person  shall  have  free  scope,]  as  it  appears  in  the  Christian  view 
of  life.  For  Christianity  is  not  merely  to  be  acknowledged  as  the  rule 
of  life,  but  it  has  in  fact  transformed  the  world;  so  that  all  oui 
thoughts,  however  alien  or  even  hostile  to  it,  are  yet  controlled  and 
pervaded  by  it." — [Savigny :  "  Private  International  Law  " ;  Edinburgh 
ed.,  1880  :  pp.  534-5. 

L. :  p.  314. — "The  controversies  of  bygone  centuries  ring  with  a 
strange  hollowness  on  the  ear.  But  if,  turning  from  ecclesiastical  his- 
torians, we  apply  the  exclusively  moral  tests  which  the  New  Testa- 
ment so  invariably  and  so  emphatically  enforces,  if  we  ask  whethei 
Cliristianity  has  ceased  to  produce  the  living  fruits  of  love  and  charit;y 


622  APPENDIX. 

and  zeal  for  truth,  tlie  conclusion  we  should  arrive  at  would  be  veij 
different.  If  it  be  true  Christianity  to  dive  with  a  passionate  charitj 
into  the  darkest  recesses  of  misery  and  of  vice,  to  irrigate  every  quartei 
of  the  earth  with  the  fertilizing  stream  of  an  almost  boundless  benevo- 
lence, and  to  include  all  the  sections  of  humanity  in  the  circle  of  an 
intense*and  eflScacious  sympathy;  if  it  be  true  Christianity  to  destroy 
or  weaken  the  barriers  which  had  separated  class  from  class  and  na- 
tion from  nation,  to  free  war  from  its  harshest  elements,  and  to  make  a 
consciousness  of  essential  equality  and  of  a  genuine  fraternity  domi- 
nate over  all  accidental  differences ;  if  it  be,  above  all,  true  Christian 
ity  to  cultivate  a  love  of  truth  for  its  own  sake,  a  spirit  of  candour  and 
of  tolerance  towards  those  from  whom  we  differ — if  these  be  the  marks 
of  a  true  and  healthy  Christianity,  then  never  since  the  days  of  the 
apostles  has  it  been  so  vigorous  as  at  present ;  and  the  decline  of  dog- 
matic systems  and  of  clerical  influence  has  been  a  measure  if  not  a 
cause  of  its  advance." — [Lecky:  "History  of  Eationalism " ;  New 
York  ed.,  1883:  Vol.  1:  pp.  200-201. 

"  For  a  time  the  leaven  of  Christianity  seemed  lost  in  the  lump  of 
human  sin ;  but  it  was  doing  its  great  work  in  ways  not  seen  by  human 
eyes.  The  most  profound  of  all  revolutions  must  require  centuries  for 
its  work.  The  good  never  dies.  The  persecutions  directed  by  tyran- 
nical emperors  against  the  new  faith,  only  helped  the  work.  What  is 
written  in  blood  is  widely  read,  and  not  soon  forgotten.  .  .  However, 
to  see  the  earnest  of  that  vast  result  Christianity  is  destined  to  work 
out  for  the  nations,  we  must  not  look  at  kings'  courts,  .  .  but  in  the 
common  walks  of  life,  its  every-day  trials ;  in  the  sweet  charities  of  the 
fireside  and  the  street ;  in  the  self-denial  that  shares  its  loaf  with  the 
distressful;  the  honest  heart  that  respects  others  as  itself.  Looking 
deeper  than  the  straws  of  the  surface,  we  see  a  stream  of  new  life  is  in 
the  world,  and,  though  choked  with  mud,  not  to  be  dammed  up.  .  . 
The  history  of  Christianity  reveals  the  majestic  preeminence  of  its 
earthly  founder." — [Theodore  Parker:  "  Discourse  of  Religion  " ;  Bos- 
ton ed.,  1843:  pp.  399^00. 

LI.  :  p.  315. — "Confucianism  is  more  purely  national  than  Bud- 
dhism and  Mohammedanism;  and  in  this  respect  it  contrasts  more 
sharply  with  the  world-wide  presence  of  Christianity.  Yet  if  Confu- 
cianism is  imknown  beyond  the  frontiers  of  China,  it  is  equally  true 
that  neither  Buddhism  nor  Mohammedanism  have  done  more  than 
spread  themselves  over  territories  contiguous  to  their  original  homes. 
.  .  In  the  streets  of  London  or  of  Paris  we  do  not  hear  of  the  labours 
of  Moslem  or  Buddhist  missionaries,  instmct  with  any  such  sense  of  a 
duty  and  mission  to  all  the  world  in  the  name  of  truth,  as  that  which 
animates,  at  this  very  hour,  those  heroic  pioneers  of  Christendom  whom 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  II.  623 

Europe  has  sent  to  Delhi  or  to  Pekin." — [Canon  Liddon:  Bampton 
Lectures;  New  York  ed.,  1868:  p.  134. 

LIT. :  p.  315. — The  rage  and  hopelessness  of  unbelief  have  forcible 
and  iragic  expression  in  words  like  these: — "  But  it  is  when  we  open 
the  Book  of  Nature,  that  book  inscribed  in  blood  and  tears ;  it  is  when 
we  study  the  laws  regulating  life,  the  laws  productive  of  development, 
— that  we  see  plainly  how  illusive  is  this  theory  that  God  is  Love.  In 
all  things  there  is  cruel,  profligate,  and  abandoned  waste.  The  law  of 
murder  is  the  law  of  growth.  Life  is  one  long  tragedy ;  creation  is 
one  great  crime.  And  not  only  is  there  waste  in  animal  and  human 
life,  there  is  also  waste  in  moral  life.  The  instinct  of  love  is  planted 
in  the  human  breast,  and  that  which  to  some  is  a  solace  is  to  others  a 
torture.  .  .  The  affections,  therefore,  are  weapons,  and  are  developed 
according  to  the  Darwinian  law.  Love  is  as  cruel  as  the  shark's  jaw, 
as  terrible  as  the  serpent's  fang.  The  moral  sense  is  founded  on  sym- 
pathy, and  sympathy  is  founded  on  seK-preservation.  .  .  The  follow- 
ing facts  result  ivom  our  investigations :  Supernatural  Christianity  is 
false.  God-worship  is  idolatry.  Prayer  is  useless.  The  soul  is  not 
immoi'tal.  There  are  no  rewards  and  there  are  no  punishments  in  a 
future  state.  .  .  In  each  generation  the  human  race  has  been  tortured, 
that  their  children  might  profit  by  their  woes.  Our  own  prosperity  is 
founded  on  the  agonies  of  the  past.  Famine,  pestilence,  and  war  are 
no  longer  essential  to  the  advancement  of  the  human  race.  But  a  sea- 
son of  mental  anguish  is  at  hand,  and  through  this  we  must  pass,  in 
order  that  our  posterity  may  rise.  The  soul  must  be  sacrificed ;  the 
hope  in  immortality  must  die.  A  sweet  and  charming  illusion  must 
be  taken  from  the  human  race,  as  youth  and  beauty  vanish  never  to 
return." — [Win  wood  Reade:  "The  Martyrdom  of  Man";  New  York 
ed. :  pp.  519,  446,  522,  542. 

LIII. :  p.  316. — "  Every  educated  man  loves  Greece,  owes  gratitude 
to  Greece.  Greece  was  the  lif  ter-up  to  the  nations  of  the  banner  of  art 
and  science,  as  Israel  was  the  lif  ter-up  of  the  banner  of  righteousness. 
Now  the  world  cannot  do  without  art  and  science.  And  the  lifter- up  of 
the  banner  of  art  and  science  was  naturally  much  occupied  with  them, 
and  conduct  was  a  homely,  plain  matter.  And  this  brilliant  Greece 
perished  for  lack  of  attention  enough  to  conduct ;  for  want  of  conduct, 
steadmess,  character.  .  .  Nay,  and  the  victorious  revelation  now,  even 
now, — in  this  age  when  more  of  beauty  and  more  of  knowledge  are  so 
much  needed,  and  knowledge,  at  any  rate,  is  so  highly  esteemed, — 
the  revelation  which  rules  the  world  even  now,  is  not  Greece's  revela- 
tion, but  Jud^a's;  not  the  preeminence  of  art  and  science,  but  the 
preeminence  of  righteousness.  .  .  But  there  is  this  difference  between 


524  APPENDIX. 

the  religion  of  the  Old  Testament  and  Christianity.  Of  the  relgicti  ol 
the  Old  Testament  we  can  pretty  well  see  to  the  end,  we  can  trace  fully 
enough  the  experimental  proof  of  it  in  history.  But  of  Christianity 
the  future  is  as  yet  almost  unknown.  For  that  the  world  cannot  get 
on  without  righteousness  we  have  the  clear  experience,  and  a  grana 
and  admirable  experience  it  is.  But  what  the  world  will  become  by 
the  thorough  use  of  that  which  is  really  righteousness,  the  methov.^ 
and  the  secret  and  the  sweet  reasonableness  of  Jesus,  we  have  as  yet 
hai'dly  any  experience  at  all.  .  Yet  Christianity  is  really  all  the  grander 
for  that  very  reason  which  makes  us  speak  about  it  in  this  sober  man- 
ner,— that  it  has  such  an  immense  development  still  before  it,  and  that 
it  has  as  yet  so  httle  shown  all  it  contains,  all  it  can  do.  Indeed,  that 
Christianity  has  already  done  so  much  as  it  has,  is  a  witness  to  it ;  and 
that  it  has  not  yet  done  more  is  a  witness  to  it  too." — [Matthew  Arnold : 
**  Literature  and  Dogma  ";  New  York  ed.,  1883:  pp.  319-20,  339-30. 

LIV. :  p.  316. — "Fromwhatever  source  they  may  have  been  derived, 
the  prophecies  in  the  PoUio  are  some  of  the  most  remarkable  things  in 
the  whole  of  heathen  literature.  It  is  impossible  to  read  of  the  Virgin 
returning,  of  the  Serpent  being  crushed,  of  the  Child  sent  down  from 
heaven,  of  earth  and  sea  and  sky  rejoicing  in  his  reign,  without  feel- 
ing, '  This  spake  he  not  of  himself.'  No  wonder  that  in  many  a  series 
of  those  marvellous  stalls,  the  glory  of  their  cathedral  choirs,  among 
the  prophets  who  have  foretold  the  Advent  of  our  Lord,  the  name  of 
Virgil  should  so  frequently  occur.  In  some  of  the  rituals  of  the  south 
of  Italy  the  22nd  of  September  contained  a  commemoration  of  Vngil, 
as  the  prophet  who  foretold  to  the  heathen  world  the  Lord's  coming. 
And  the  Sequence,  appropriated  to  that  day,  in  allusion  to  the  legend 
which  represents  St.  Paul  as  having  visited  the  tomb  of  Virgil,  com* 

menced  thus : — 

Ad  Maronis  mausoleum 
Flebat  Paulus  super  eum 

Piae  rorem  lacryrasB  : 
Quanti,  inquit,  te  fecissem 
SI  te  vivum  invenissem, 

Poetarum  maxime ! " 

[J.  M.  NeaJe:  Essays  on  Liturgiology ; 

London  ed.,  1867:  pp.  394-6. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  X. 

Note  I. :  page  328. — "  Descended  from  a  family  of  note,  he  [Notbert" 
lived  at  first  after  the  manner  of  the  ordinary  secular  clergy,  somestimea 
at  the  court  of  the  archbishop  Frederic  the  First,  of  Cologne,  sometunes 
at  that  of  the  emperor  Henry  the  Fifth.  But  in  the  year  1114,  being 
caught  by  a  storm,  while  riding  out  for  his  pleasure,  a  flash  of  light- 
ning struck  near  him,  and  prostrated  him  to  the  earth.  On  recovering 
his  breath  and  coming  to  his  senses,  he  felt  admonished  by  the  thought 
of  the  sudden  death  from  which  he  had  been  saved  as  by  a  miracle,  and 
resolved  to  begin  a  more  serious  course  of  life.  .  .  He  laid  aside  his 
sumptuous  apparel  for  a  humbler  dress,  and  after  a  season  of  earnest 
spiritual  preparation,  entered  the  order  of  priests.  .  .  Whenever  he 
entered  the  vicinity  of  villages  or  castles,  and  the  herdsmen  saw  him, 
they  left  their  cottages,  and  ran  to  announce  his  arrival.  As  he  proceeded 
onward,  the  bells  rang ;  young  and  old,  men  and  women,  hastened  to 
church,  where,  after  performing  mass,  he  spoke  the  word  of  exhorta- 
tion to  the  assembled  people.  After  sermon  he  conversed  with  indi- 
viduals on  the  concerns  of  the  soul.  He  did  not  take  up  his  residence, 
as  was  customary  wdth  itinerant  ecclesiastics  and  monks,  in  the  church  or 
in  a  monastery,  but  in  the  midst  of  the  town,  or  in  the  castle,  where  he 
could  speak  to  all,  and  bestow  on  such  as  needed  the  benefit  of  his 
spiritual  advice.  Thus  he  made  himself  greatly  beloved  among  the 
people."— [Neander:  "History  of  the  Church":  Vol.  IV. :  pp.  244-5. 

"He  sold  all  his  possessions,  bestowed  the  money  on  the  poor,  re- 
serving to  himself  only  ten  marks  of  silver,  and  a  mule  to  carry  the 
sacred  vestments  and  utensils  for  the  altar;  and  then,  clothed  in  a 
lamb-skin,  with  a  hempen  cord  round  his  loins,  he  set  out  to  preach 
repentance  and  a  new  life."  —  [Jameson:  "Legends  of  Monastic 
Orders";  London  ed.,  1872  :  p.  210. 

n. :  p.  331. — "Bruno  Bauer  maintained  that  the  Johannine  narra- 
tive was  not,  as  the  treatment  of  it  by  Strauss  supposed,  the  simple  de- 
posit of  a  legendary  tradition,  but  was  the  reflective  work  of  a  thinker 
and  of  a  poet  conscious  of  his  procedure — the  product  of  an  individual 
<joncoption.  The  history  of  Jesus  thus  became  a  philosophical  and  po- 
40  (C25) 


626  APPENDIX. 

etical  romance;  which  occasioned  the  witty  expression  of  Ebrard,  who 
reduced  the  narrative  of  it  to  a  single  line :  '  At  that  time  it  came  to 

pass that  nothing  came  to  pass ! ' " — [Godet :  "  Comm.  on  Gospel  oi 

John";  Edinburgh  ed.,  1876  :  Vol.  1  :  p.  11. 

III. :  p.  331. — "Between  good  men  and  God  there  is  a  cordial  friend- 
ship, virtue  uniting  them.  Do  I  say,  friendship  ?  Nay,  rather  a  rela- 
tionship and  likeness ;  since  in  fact  a  good  man  himself  only  differs 
from  God  in  his  temporal  condition ;  he  is  his  disciple,  his  emulator, 
and  his  true  child." — [Seneca  :  De  Proy. :  i. 

'*He  [the  wise  man]  makes  himself  equal  with  the  gods;  he  tends 
toward  God,  mindful  of  his  own  original.  No  wicked  man  strives  to 
ascend  to  God,  whence  he  had  descended.  But  why  is  it,  that  you  do 
not  judge  that  something  of  the  divine  exists  in  him  who  is  a  part  of 
God  ?  All  this  system,  in  which  we  are  contained,  it  is  one,  it  is  God ; 
and  Ave  are  his  companions  and  his  members." — [Ep.  Mor. :  xcii. 

'" God  is  near  thee,  "\vith  thee,  within  thee:  thus  I  say  to  you,  Lucil- 
ius :  a  sacred  spirit  resides  within  us,  observer  and  guardian  of  our  evil 
things  and  our  good :  he,  according  as  he  is  treated  by  us,  so  treats  us. 
No  good  man  is  without  God." — [Seneca  :  Ep.  ad  Lucil. :  XLI, 

"  The  first  and  the  chief  est  punishment  of  the  wicked  is  to  have  sin- 
ned ;  nor  is  there  any  crime,  however  Fortune  may  embellish  it  with 
her  gifts,  however  she  may  defend  and  vindicate  it,  which  stands  un- 
punished; since  the  torment  of  wickedness  is  in  the  wickedness  itself." 
— [Ep.  Mor. :  xcvii. 

"  So  let  us  give,  in  the  same  way  in  which  we  should  wish  to  re- 
ceive ;  above  all  things,  [let  us  do  it]  freely,  speedily,  and  without  hes- 
itation. "—[De  Benef. :  II.:  1. 

"Never  did  that  perfect  man  who  had  by  diligence  attained  virtue 
rail  at  Fortune ;  never  received  he  with  lamentation  things  accidental. 
.  .  Whatsoever  happened,  it  was  not  spurned  by  him  as  evil,  and  as 
something  that  had  fallen  upon  him,  but  as  a  thing  committed  to  him. 
'This,  whatever  it  is,'  said  he,  'is  mine;  it  is  troublesome  and  hard; 
for  this  reason  let  us  diligently  perform  it.'  .  .  He  gave  to  many  an 
understanding  of  his  own  character,  and  shined  before  them  no  other- 
wise than  as  a  light  shines  amid  darkness." — [Ep.  Mor. :  cxx. 

IV. :  p.  332. — "  The  evil-doer  mourns  in  this  world,  and  he  mourns 
in  the  next;  he  mourns  in  both.  He  mourns,  and  suffers,  when  he  sees 
the  evil  of  his  own  work.  .  .  As  a  solid  rock  is  not  shaken  by  the 
wind,  wise  people  falter  not  amidst  blame  and  praise.  Wise  people, 
after  they  have  listened  to  the  laws,  become  serene,  like  a  deep,  smooth, 
and  still  lake.  .  .  If  a  man  does  what  is  good,  let  him  do  it  again ;  let 
nim  delight  in  it ;  happiness  is  the  outcome  of  good.   .   .   Not  to  com- 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  X.  627 

mit  any  sin,  to  do  good,  and  to  purify  one's  mind,  that  is  the  teaching 
of  the  Awakened.  .  .  Not  to  blame,  not  to  strike,  to  Hve  restrained 
under  the  law,  to  be  moderate  in  eating,  to  sleep  and  sit  alone,  and  to 
dwell  on  the  highest  thoughts, — this  is  the  teaching  of  the  Awakened.*' 
— [Buddha's  "  Dhammapada  " :  Miiller's  trans. ;  London  ed.,  1870  :  L  : 
15;  VI.:  81-2;  IX.:  118;  XIV.:  183,  185. 

"  That  moral  code  [the  Buddhist],  taken  by  itself,  is  one  of  the  most 
perfect  which  the  world  has  ever  known.  On  this  point  all  testimo- 
nies, from  hostile  and  from  friendly  qu£irters,  agree.  Spence  Hardy,  a 
Wesleyan  missionary,  speaking  of  the  'Footsteps  of  the  Law,'  admits 
that  a  collection  might  be  made  from  the  precepts  of  this  work,  which 
in  the  purity  of  its  ethics  could  hardly  be  equalled  from  any  other 
heathen  author.  M.  Laboulaye  remarks:  'It  is  difficult  to  compre- 
hend how  men  not  assisted  by  revelation  could  have  soared  so  high, 
and  approached  so  near  to  the  truth.'  .  .  Among  the  virtues  recom- 
mended, we  find  not  only  reverence  of  parents,  care  for  children,  sub- 
mission to  authority,  gratitude,  moderation  in  time  of  prosperity,  sub- 
mission in  time  of  trial,  equanimity  at  all  times,  but  virtues  unknown 
in  any  heathen  system  of  morality,  such  as  the  duty  of  forgiving  insults, 
and  not  rewarding  evil  with  evil.  All  virtues,  we  are  told,  spring  from 
Maitri,  and  this  Maitri  can  only  be  translated  by  charity  and  love.  .  . 
Mr.  Barthelemy  St.  Hilaire  says  :  '  I  do  not  hesitate  to  add,  that 
with  the  single  exception  of  Christ,  there  is  no  figure,  among  the 
founders  of  religion,  more  pure  or  attractive  than  that  of  Buddha. 
His  life  shows  no  stain.  His  continual  heroism  was  equal  to  his  con- 
viction ;  and  if  the  theory  which  he  proclaimed  is  false,  his  personal 
example  is  without  reproach.  He  is  the  finished  model  of  all  the  vir- 
tues which  he  preached ;  his  seK-abnegation,  his  charity,  his  unchange- 
able sweetness,  never  for  a  moment  give  way;  at  twenty-nine  years 
he  abandons  his  Father's  royal  court  to  become  a  religious  mendicant ; 
through  six  years  of  meditative  retreat  he  silently  matures  his  doc- 
trine; he  propagates  it,  by  the  simple  power  of  persuasive  speech, 
through  more  than  half  a  century ;  and  when  he  dies,  in  the  arms  of 
his  disciples,  it  is  with  the  serenity  of  a  sage  who  has  practised  good- 
ness all  his  life,  and  who  is  fully  assured  that  he  has  found  the  truth.' " 
—[Max  Minier :  ' '  Chips, "  etc. ;  New  York  ed. ,  1881 :  Vol.  1 :  pp.  217-19. 

v.;  p.  332. — "The  most  renowned  demi-god  of  Indian  mythology, 
and  most  celebrated  hero  of  Indian  history,  is  the  eighth  Avatara  or 
incarnation  of  Vishnu.  He  cannot  be  said  to  belong  really  to  the 
Epic  age,  but  almost  exclusively  to  the  Puranic  [not  earlier,  Hard- 
■^ick  says,  than  the  eighth,  nor  later  than  the  twelfth  century,  of  the 
Christian  era:  "Christ  and  other  Masters";  p.  198.]  .  .  Her  [his 
mother's]  eighth  child  was  Krishna,  who  was  bom  at  midnight,  with 


628  APPENDIX. 

a  very  black  skin,  and  a  peculiar  curl  of  hair,  resembling"  a  Saint  An 
drew's  cross,  on  his  breast.  The  gods  now  interposed  to  preserve  the 
life  of  his  favored  baby  from  Kansan's  vigilance,  and  accordingly 
lulled  the  guards  of  the  palace  to  sleep  with  the  Yoga-nidra,  or  myste* 
rious  slumber.  .  .  Krishna  now  incited  Nanda  and  the  cowherds  to 
abandon  the  worship  of  Indi'a,  and  to  adopt  that  of  the  cows  which 
supported  them,  and  the  mountains  which  afforded  them  pasturage. 
Indra,  incensed  at  the  loss  of  his  offerings,  opened  the  gates  of  heaven 
upon  the  whole  race,  and  would  have  deluged  them,  had  not  our  hero 
plucked  up  the  mountain  Govarddhana,  and  held  it  as  a  substantial 
umbrella  above  the  land.  He  soon  took  to  repose  from  his  labors,  and 
amused  himself  with  the  Gopis,  or  shepherdesses,  of  whom  he  mamed 
seven  or  eight,  among  whom  Radha  was  the  favorite,  and  to  whom  he 
taught  the  round  dance.  .  .  He  afterward  married  Satyabhama, 
daughter  of  Satrajit,  and  carried  off  Rukmini,  daughter  of  Bhishmaka. 
His  harem  numbered  sixty  thousand  wives,  but  his  progeny  was  lim- 
ited to  eighteen  thousand  sons.  When  afterward  on  a  visit  to  Indra's 
heaven,  he  behaved,  at  the  persuasion  of  his  wife,  in  a  manner  very 
unbecoming  a  guest,  by  stealing  the  famous  Parijata  tree,  which  was 
then  thriving  in  Indra's  garden.  A  contest  ensued,  in  which  Khrishna 
defeated  the  gods,  and  carried  off  the  sacred  tree." — [The  Bhagavad- 
G-ita  :  Thomson's  trans. ;  Chicago  ed.,  1874:  pp.  252-4. 

VI.:  p.  335. — The  religion  of  the  Br^hmawas  '*has  no  knowledge 
either  of  pilgrimages  or  of  holy  places.  Thousands  of  times  in  the 
Brahma?ias  the  sacred  enclosure  is  compared  to  this  lower  world,  ui 
contrast  with  heaven ;  it  is  never  regarded  as  forming  a  definite  local- 
ity, and,  as  is  somewhere  said,  '  when  consecrated  by  the  holy  word, 
the  entire  earth  is  an  altar.'" — [Barth:  "  Religions  of  India";  Boston 
ed.,1882:  p.  62. 

"  Our  divine  religion,  the  truth  of  which  (if  any  history  be  true)  is 
abundantly  proved  by  historical  evidence,  has  no  need  of  such  aids  as 
many  are  willing  to  give  it,  by  asserting  that  the  wisest  men  of  this 
world  were  ignorant  of  the  two  great  maxims,  that  '  we  must  act  in 
respect  of  others  as  we  should  wish  them  to  act  in  respect  of  oui'selves,' 
and  that,  *  instead  of  retumiug  evil  for  evil,  we  should  confer  benefits 
even  on  those  who  injure  us ' ;  but  the  first  rule  is  implied  in  a  speech 
of  Lysias,  and  expressed  in  distinct  phrases  by  Thales  and  Pittacus 
and  I  have  even  seen  it  word  for  word  in  the  original  of  Confucius, 
which  I  carefully  compared  with  the  Latin  translation.  .  .  The  beau- 
tiful Aryd  couplet,  which  was  written  at  least  three  centuries  before 
our  era,  pronounces  the  duty  of  a  good  man,  even  in  the  moment  of 
bis  destruction,  to  consist  not  only  m  forgiving,  but  even  in  a  desire 
of  benefiting,  his  destroyer,  as  the  sandal -tree,  in  the  instant  of  ita 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  X  629 

overthrow,  sheds  a  perfume  on  the  axe  which  fells  it ;  and  .  .  .  th« 
vers6  of  Sadi  represents  a  return  of  good  for  good  as  a  right  reciprocity, 
but  says  to  the  virtuous  man,  *  Confer  benefits  on  him  who  has  injured 
thee, '  using  an  Arabick  sentence,  and  a  maxim  apparently  of  the  an- 
cient Arabs." — [Sir  William  Jones:  Works;  London  ed.,  1807:  Vol.  3: 
pp.  243-244. 

VII. :  p.  335. — "  Nor  do  I  think  the  Jews  themselves  dare  contend 
that  no  one  has  belonged  to  God  except  the  Israelites,  since  the  in- 
crease of  Israel  began  on  the  rejection  of  his  elder  brother.  .  .  They 
cannot  deny  that  there  have  been  certain  men,  even  of  other  nations, 
who  belonged,  not  by  earthly  but  by  heavenly  fellowship,  to  the  true 
Israelites,  the  citizens  of  the  country  that  is  above.  Because,  if  they 
deny  this,  they  can  be  most  easily  confuted  by  the  case  of  the  holy  and 
wonderful  man  Job,  who  was  neither  a  native  nor  a  proselyte,  but, 
being  bred  of  the  Idumean  race,  arose  there  and  died  there,  and  who 
is  so  praised  by  the  divine  oracle  that  no  man  of  his  times  is  put  on  a 
level  with  him  as  regards  justice  and  piety." — [Augustine :  ' '  Civ.  Dei " : 
XVIII.:  47. 

"  Therefore  if  any  of  them  [the  heathen  philosophers]  be  found  to 
have  said  what  Christ  too  hath  said,  we  congratulate  him,  but  we  fol- 
low him  not.  '  But  he  came  before  Christ. '  If  any  man  speaketh  wha  t 
is  true,  is  he  therefore  before  the  Truth  itself  ?  Eegard  Christ,  O  man, 
not  when  He  came  to  thee,  but  when  He  made  thee." — [Augustine:  on 
Ps.  CXLI. :  vs.  7. 

"  If  the  Gentiles  themselves  could  have  anything  holy  and  right  in 
their  doctrines,  our  saints  did  not  condemn  it,  however  much  the  Gen- 
tiles themselves  were  to  be  detested,  for  their  superstitions,  and  idola- 
try, and  pride,  and  the  rest  of  their  con:Tiptions.  For  when  Paul  the 
Apostle  also  was  saying  something  concerning  God  before  the  Atheni- 
ans, he  adduced  as  a  proof  of  what  he  said,  that  certain  of  them  had 
said  something  to  the  same  effect ;  which  certainly  would  not  be  con- 
demned but  recognized  in  them  if  they  should  come  to  Christ.  And 
the  holy  Cyprian  uses  similar  evidence  against  the  same  heathens." 

He  concludes  in  regard  to  both  heathen  and  heretics,  that ' '  we  ought 
not  to  be  moved  to  the  desire  of  correcting  what  is  bad  in  them  belong- 
ing to  themselves,  without  being  willing  to  acknowledge  what  is  good 
in  them  of  Christ." — [Augustine:  on  Baptism  (against  the  Doiiatists): 
VI.:  44. 

VIII. :  p.  338. — "  We  are  altogether  ignorant  of  religious  history — ^a 
fact  which  I  hope  some  other  lecturer  will  prove  to  you  at  a  future 
time — if  we  do  not  lay  it  down  as  a  fundamental  principle,  that  Chris- 
tianity at  its  origin  is  no  other  than  Judaism,  with  its  fertile  principles 


630  APPENDIX. 

of  almsgiving  and  charity,  with  its  absolute  faith  in  the  future  of  hu 
manity,  with  that  joy  of  heart  of  which  Judaism  has  always  held  tlie 
secret, — and  denuded  only  of  the  distinctive  observances  and  features 
which  had  been  invented  to  give  a  character  of  its  own  to  the  peculia: 
religion  of  the  children  of  Israel." — [Renan  :  "Hibbert  Lectures"; 
London  ed.,  1880:  pp.  16-17. 

Compare  the  words  of  Canon  Liddon,  and  their  superior  justness  and 
force  appear  beyond  question : — 

"  Christianity  was  cradled  in  Judaism  ;  but  was  the  later  Judaism 
»o  entirely  in  harmony  with  the  temper  and  aim  of  Christianity  f 
Was  the  age  of  the  Zealots,  of  Judas  the  Gaulonite,  of  Theudas,  likely 
to  welcome  the  spiritual  empire  of  such  a  teacher  as  our  Lord  ?  Were 
the  moral  dispositions  of  the  Jews,  their  longings  for  a  political  Mes- 
siah, their  fierce  legalism,  their  passionate  jealousy  for  the  preroga- 
tives of  their  race,  calculated — I  do  not  say  to  further  the  triumph  of 
the  Church,  but — to  enter  even  distantly  into  her  distinctive  spu'it  and 
doctrines  ?  Did  not  the  Synagogue  persecute  Jesus  to  death,  when  it 
had  once  discovered  the  real  character  of  his  teaching  ?  .  .  Men  do 
not  persecute  systems  which  answer  to  their  real  sympathies.  St.  Paul 
was  not  a  Christian  at  heart,  and  without  intending  it,  before  his 
conversion." — [Bampton  Lectures;  New  York  ed.,  1868:  pp.  137-8. 

Dr.  Channing's  judgment  is  equally  clear,  and  as  strongly  ex- 
pressed : — 

"  Some  have  pretended  that  Christianity  grew  from  the  ruins  of  the 
ancient  faith.  But  this  is  not  true :  for  the  decline  of  the  heathen  sys- 
tems was  the  product  of  causes  singularly  adverse  to  the  origination  of 
such  a  system  as  Christianity.  .  .  We  cannot  find,  then,  the  origin  of 
Christianity  in  the  heathen  world.  Shall  we  look  for  it  ui  the  Jewish  ? 
You  know  the  character,  feelings,  expectations  of  the  descendants  of 
Abraham  at  the  appearance  of  Jesus  ;  and  you  need  not  be  told  that  a 
system  more  opposed  to  the  Jewish  mind  than  that  which  he  taught 
cannot  be  imagined.  There  was  nothing  friendly  to  it  in  the  soU  or 
climate  of  Judea.  As  easily  might  the  luxuriant  trees  of  our  forests 
spring  from  the  sands  of  an  Ai^abian  desert.  .  .  This  suddenness  with 
which  this  religion  broke  forth,  this  maturity  of  the  system  at  the  ver  ^' 
moment  of  its  birth,  this  absence  of  gradual  development,  seems  to  me 
a  strong  mark  of  its  Divine  original." — [Dr.  Channing:  Works;  Bos- 
ton ed.,  1843:  Vol.  3:  pp.  358-361. 

Renan  himself,  in  his  most  recent  work,  makes  the  broadest  distinc- 
tion between  the  incipient  Christianity,  and  that  which  has  ever  since 
been  recognized  and  inspiring  among  men : — 

"  While  wholly  Jewish  at  its  origin,  Christianity  has  come  so  fully 
to  lay  aside,  with  time,  almost  everything  which  it  derived  from  that 
race,  that  the  thesis  of  those  who  consider  it  an  Aryan  religion,  par 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  X  631 

excellence,  is  in  many  respects  true.  During  the  centuries,  we  have 
put  into  it  our  own  modes  of  feeling,  all  our  aspirations,  all  our  char- 
acteristics, all  our  imperfections.  The  exegesis  by  which  Christianity 
may  be  carved  from  the  contents  of  the  Old  Testament,  is  the  falsest  in 
the  world.  Christianity  has  been  the  breaking  off  from  Judaism,  the 
abrogation  of  the  Thora.  St.  Bernard,  Francis  of  Assisi,  St.  Elizabeth, 
St.  Theresa,  Francis  de  Sales,  Vincent  de  Paul,  Fenelon,  Channing, 
these  are  not  Jews  in  any  respect.  They  are  men  of  our  race,  feeling 
with  our  sensibilities,  thinking  with  our  brain.  Christianity  has  been 
tlie  traditional  principle,  upon  which  they  have  embroidered  their  own 
poem.  .  .  The  Bible  has  thus  borne  fruits  which  were  not  at  all  its 
•own.  Judaism  has  been  only  the  wild-stock,  on  which  the  Aryan  race 
has  produced  its  flower.  In  England,  in  Scotland,  the  Bible  has  become 
the  national  book  of  that  branch  of  the  Aryan  people  which  least  of 
.all  resembles  the  Hebrew."— [*' Marc- Aurele";  Paris,  1882:  pp.  635-36. 
The  significant  fact  in  this  is,  that  while  Judaism  followed  its  own 
line  of  development,  up  to  the  time  of  Christ's  advent,  altogether  new 
forces  there  came  into  exhibition,  out  of  which  have  proceeded  the 
rich,  various,  and  incessant  spiritual  life  and  culture  of  the  following 
■centuries.  It  is  not  the  world  of  mediasval  or  of  modern  thought 
which  has  made  Christianity.  It  is  Christianity  which  has  shai^ed, 
.educated,  and  inspired  that  world. 

IX.:  p.  340. — "Philo  did  not  participate  in  the  warm  desires  and 
.hopes  which  filled  the  heart  of  a  believing  Jew.  The  idea  of  the  Mes- 
siah has  become  in  him  a  dead  coal :  nothing  but  the  phlegma  of  it 
remains  with  him,  the  hope  of  a  miraculous  restoration  of  the  scattered 
Jews  from  all  parts  of  the  earth  to  Palestine  by  a  superhuman  Divine 
appearance,  which  shall  be  recognized  only  by  the  just.  ,  .  It  must  be 
acknowledged,  that  in  his  system  the  human  mind  has  made  the  at- 
tempt to  complete  the  union  of  the  pre-Christian  religions.  To  Chris- 
tianity, hardly  then  in  its  dawn,  he  presents  himself  in  this  respect  as 
a  rival.  But  blinding  as  is  the  resemblance,  on  a  superficial  view,  of 
many  of  his  ideas  and  modes  of  expression  with  Christianity,  the  prin- 
ciple of  both  is  fundamentally  different,  and  even  the  seemingly  simi- 
lar, when  taken  in  its  connection  with  the  whole,  has  a  quite  different 
meaning.  .  .  His  system  came,  like  an  apparitional  contrast,  to  the 
cradle  of  Christianity ;  or  appeared  like  an  impalpable  dissolving  Fata- 
morgana  on  the  horizon  on  which  Christianity  had  to  arise." — [Dorner : 
"The  Person  of  Christ";  Edinburgh  ed.,  1861:  Vol.  1:  pp.  34,  39-40. 

X. :  p.  343. — The  infidel  explanation  of  the  development  of  Chi'isti- 
finity,  as  set  forth  by  one  of  the  most  energetic  of  recent  sceptical 
writers,  seems  about  as  sufficient  as  would  be  an  attempt  to  account 
for  the  Atlantic  Ocean  by  the  upsetting  of  a  child's  milk-cup : — 


r,32  APPENlDIZ, 

"However  much  tlie  Pharisees  and  Sadducees  might  difPer  on  n-at- 
ters  of  tradition,  they  were  perfectly  agreed  on  this  point,  that  tli«" 
ceremonial  laws  were  necessary  for  salvation.  These  laws  could  never 
be  given  up  by  Jews,  unless  they  first  became  heretics ;  and  this  was 
what  eventually  occurred.  A  schism  arose  among  th.e  Jews;  the  sec- 
tarians were  defeated  and  expelled.  Foiled  in  their  first  object,  they 
cast  aside  the  law  of  Moses,  and  offered  the  Hebrew  religion  without 
the  Hebrew  ceremonies  to  the  Greek  and  Roman  world.  .  .  Jesus  was 
a  carpenter  by  trade,  and  was  urged  by  a  prophetic  call  to  leave  hia 
workshop  and  to  go  forth  into  the  world,  preaching  the  gospel  which 
he  had  received.  The  current  fancies  respectmg  the  approaching  de- 
struction of  the  world,  the  conquest  of  the  Evil  Power,  and  the  reign 
of  God,  had  fermented  in  his  mind,  and  had  made  him  the  subject  of 
a  remarkable  hallucination.  He  believed  that  he  was  the  promised 
Messiah  or  Son  of  Man,  who  would  be  sent  to  prepare  the  world  for 
the  kingdom  of  God,  and  who  would  be  appointed  to  judge  the  souls 
of  men,  and  to  reign  over  them  on  the  earth." — [Win wood  Reade: 
*' Martyrdom  of  Man";  New  York  ed. :  pp.  218,  227. 

Another  sceptical  theory  on  the  subject  seems  no  more  satisfactory, 
and  to  do,  if  possible,  rather  less  justice  to  human  intelligence : — 

"  Orthodox  Christology  is  the  product  of  ages  of  darkness,  and  has 
nothing  in  common  with  the  lessons  of  Jesus,  as  propagated  either  by 
Peter  or  by  Paul.  It  is  at  warfare  wdth  philosophy  and  science,  and 
sustained  by  constant  appeals  to  credulity  and  ignorance.  It  stands, 
because  thousands  know  no  better. " — [Wise :  ' '  Origin  of  Christianity  " ; 
Cincinnati  ed.,  1868:  p.  535. 

XI. :  p.  342. — "  Believing  himself  sent  from  Heaven  as  the  common 
moderator  and  arbiter  of  all  nations,  and  subduing  those  by  force 
whom  he  could  not  associate  to  himself  by  fair  offers,  he  labored  thus 
that  he  might  bring  all  regions,  far  and  near,  under  the  same  domin- 
ion. And  then,  as  in  a  festival  goblet,  mixing  lives,  manners,  cus- 
toms, wedlock,  all  together,  he  ordained  that  every  one  should  take 
the  whole  habitable  world  for  his  country,  of  which  his  camp  and 
army  should  be  the  chief  metropolis  and  garrison :  that  his  friends  and 
kindred  should  be  the  good  and  vii'tuous,  and  that  the  vicious  only 
should  be  accounted  foreigners." — [Plutarch :  on  Alexander  the  Great : 
"Morals":  Boston  ed.,  1874:  Vol.  1:  p.  481. 

XII. :  p.  344. — "  For  if  any  one  thinks  that  less  fruit  of  renown  is  to 
be  derived  from  Greek  verses  than  from  Latin,  he  is  vastly  mistaken ; 
inasmuch  as  the  Greek  writings  are  read  among  almost  all  peoples,, 
while  the  Latin  are  confined  to  the  boundaries  of  the  language  itself, 
wliich  are  narrow  enough." — [Cicero:  "  Orat.  pro  Arch.";  X. 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  X. 

Elsewhere  Cicero  speaks  of  the  comparative  meagreness  of  the  Latin 
lan^age,  though  at  other  times  he  eulogized  it. — [Com  p.  De  Finibus* 
I. :  3  ;  ni. :  15. 

Horace  says  that  '  New  words,  lately  fashioned,  have  permission,  if 
they  descend  from  a  Greek  source,  and  are  not  violently  turned  aside ' 
in  their  new  use. — [Art.  Poet. ;  52-3. 

"  The  Greek  language  was  already  generally  diffused  in  Italy  in  the 
time  of  Hannibal.  In  the  higher  circles  a  knowledge  of  that  language, 
which  was  the  general  medium  of  intercourse  for  ancient  civilization, 
had  long  been  a  far  from  uncommon  accomplishment;  and  now,  when 
the  change  in  the  position  of  Rome  had  so  enormously  increased  the 
intercourse  with  foreigners  and  the  foreign  traffic,  such  a  knowledge 
was,  if  not  necessary,  yet  in  all  probability  of  very  material  import- 
ance, to  the  merchant  as  well  as  the  statesman.  By  means  of  the  Italian 
slaves  and  f  reedmen,  a  very  large  portion  of  whom  were  Greek  or  haK- 
Greek  by  birth,  the  Greek  language  and  Greek  knowledge  to  a  certain 
extent  reached  even  the  lower  ranks  of  the  population,  especially  in 
the  capital.  .  .  Men  of  senatorial  families  not  only  addressed  a  Greek 
audience  in  Greek,  but  even  published  their  speeches,  and  in  the  time 
of  Hannibal  wrote  their  chronicles  in  Greek.  .  .  We  have  already 
spoken  of  the  metrical  Annals  of  Naevius,  and  of  Ennius  [in  Latin] ; 
both  belong  to  the  earliest  historical  literature  of  the  Romans,  and 
those  of  Naevius  may  be  regarded  as  the  oldest  of  all  Roman  historical 
works.  At  nearly  the  same  period  were  composed  the  Greek  '  Histo- 
ries '  of  Quintus  Fabius  Pictor,  and  of  Publius  Scipio,  the  son  of  Scipio 
Af ricanus.  In  the  former  case  they  availed  themselves  of  the  poetical  art 
which  was  already  to  a  certain  extent  developed,  and  addressed  them- 
selves to  a  pubhc  with  a  taste  for  poetry ;  in  the  latter  case  they  found 
the  Greek  forms  ready  to  their  hand,  and  addressed  themselves  pri- 
marily to  the  cultivated  foreigner.  The  former  plan  was  adopted  by  the 
plebeian  authors ;  the  latter  by  those  of  quality.  .  .  Cato's  'Origines,* 
not  published  before  the  close  of  this  epoch,  formed  at  once  the  oldest 
historical  work  written  in  Latin,  and  the  first  important  prose  work  in 
Roman  literature. " — [Mom  m  sen :  ' '  History  of  Rome  " ;  New  York  ed. , 
Vol.  II. :  pp.  492-3,  545-6. 

XIII.:  p.  344. — "The  working  force  in  the  universe  [according  to 
the  Stoics]  is  God.  The  world  is  bounded  and  spherical.  It  possesses 
a  general  unity,  while  containing  the  greatest  variety  in  its  several 
parts.  The  beauty  and  adaptation  of  the  world  can  only  have  come 
from  a  thinking  mind,  and  prove,  therefore,  the  existence  of  Deity. 
Since  the  world  contains  parts  endowed  with  self-consciousness,  the 
world  as  a  whole,  which  must  be  more  perfect  than  any  of  its  parts, 
cannot  be  unconscious ;  the  consciousness  which  belongs  to  the  uni 


634  APPENDIJ-, 

verse  is  Deity.  The  latter  permeates  the  world  as  an  all-pervading 
breath,  as  artistically  creative  fire,  as  the  soul  and  reason  of  the 
All,  and  contains  the  rational  germs  of  all  things.  .  .  At  the  end  of  a 
certain  cosmical  period  all  things  are  reabsorbed  into  the  Deity,  the 
whole  universe  being  resolved  into  fire  in  a  general  conflagration. 
The  evolution  of  the  world  then  begins  anew,  and  so  on  without  end. 
.  .  The  human  soul  is  a  part  of  the  Deity,  or  an  emanation  from  tha 
same;  the  soul  and  its  source  act  and  react  upon  each  other.  The 
soul  is  the  warm  breath  in  us.  Although  it  outlives  the  body,  it  is  yet 
perishable,  and  can  only  endure,  at  the  longest,  till  the  termination  of 
the  world-period  in  which  it  exists.  .  .  The  sage  alone  attains  to  the 
complete  performance  of  his  duty.  The  sage  is  without  passion,  al- 
though not  without  feeling;  he  is  not  indulgent,  but  just  toward  him- 
self and  others;  he  alone  is  free;  he  is  king  and  lord,  and  is  inferior  in 
inner  worth  to  no  other  rational  being,  not  even  to  Zeus  himself;  he 
is  lord  also  over  his  own  life,  and  can  lawfully  bring  it  to  an  end  ac- 
cording to  his  own  free  self-determination." — [Ueberweg:  "Hist,  of 
Philosophy";  New  York  ed.,  1873:  Vol.  1:  pp.  194,  198. 

XTV. :  p.  345. — *' I  therefore  spent  as  much  of  my  time  as  possible 
with  one  who  had  lately  settled  in  our  city — a  sagacious  man,  holding 
a  high  position  among  the  Platonists — and  I  progressed,  and  made  the 
greatest  improvements  daily.  And  the  perception  of  immaterial 
things  quite  overpowered  me,  and  the  contemplation  of  ideas  furnished 
my  mind  with  wings,  so  that  in  a  little  while  I  supposed  that  I  had 
become  wise ;  and,  such  was  my  stupidity,  I  expected  forthwith  to  look 
upon  God,  for  this  is  the  end  of  Plato's  philosophy." — [Justin  Martyr: 
"Dial,  with  Trypho":  II. 

XY.  :  p.  346. — "During  this  inward  sti-uggle,  the  acquaintance 
which  he  [Augustine]  had  gained,  by  means  of  Latin  translations, 
with  works  relating  to  the  Platonic  and  New-Platonic  philosophy, 
proved  of  great  service  to  him.  He  says  himself  that  they  enkindled 
in  his  mind  an  incredible  ardor.  They  addressed  themselves  to  his 
religious  consciousness.  Nothing  but  a  philosophy  which  addressed 
the  heart — a  philosophy  which  coincided  with  the  inward  witness  of  a 
nature  in  man  akin  to  the  divine,  .  .  nothing  but  such  a  ijhilosophy 
could  have  possessed  such  attractions  for  him  in  the  then  tone  of  his 
mind.  .  .  He  arrived,  in  this  way,  first  at  a  religious  idealism,  that 
seized  and  appropriated  to  itself  Christian  elements ;  and  was  thus  pre- 
pared to  be  led  over  to  the  simple  faith  of  the  gospel.  At  first  this 
Platonic  philosophy  was  his  all ;  and  he  sought  nothing  further.  .  .  As 
he  afterwards  said  of  himself,  he  wanted  that  which  alone  can  give  the 
right  understanding  of  Christianity,  and  without  which  any  man  will 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  X,  635 

have  only  the  shell  of  Christianity  without  its  kernel — the  Love  which 
is  rooted  in  Humility.  .  .  By  degrees,  in  proportion  as  Cln"istianity 
penetrated  from  the  inner  life  through  his  whole  mode  of  thinking,  ha 
came  to  perceive  the  difference  between  Platonic  and  Christian  ideas, 
and  unshackled  his  system  of  faith  from  the  fetters  of  Platonism." — 
[Neander:  Hist,  of  Church;  Boston  ed.,  1854:  Vol.  2:  pp.  355-8. 

XVI. :  p.  346.—"  One  might  indulge  in  an  interesting  speculation 
whether  Seneca,  like  so  many  other  Stoics,  had  not  Shemitic  blood  in 
his  veins.  The  whole  district  from  which  he  came  was  thickly  popu- 
lated with  Phoenician  settlers,  either  from  the  mother  country,  or  from 
her  great  African  colony.  The  name  of  his  native  province  Baetica, 
the  name  of  his  native  city  Corduba,  are  both  said  to  be  Phoenician. 
Even  his  own  name,  though  commonly  derived  from  the  Latin,  may 
perhaps  have  a  Shemitic  origin ;  for  it  was  borne  by  a  Jew  of  Palestine 
early  in  the  second  century.  This  however  is  thrown  out  merely  as  a 
conjecture." — [Lightfoot:  Comm.  on  Ep.  to  Philippians;  London  ed., 
1879:  p.  277. 

If  the  philosopher  had  any  relationship  of  blood  to  the  Jewish  peo- 
ple, he  certainly  failed  to  recognize  it  himself  when  he  said  of  the  Jews, 
as  quoted  by  Augustine : — 

"  When,  meanwhile,  the  customs  of  that  most  accursed  nation  have 
gained  such  strength  that  they  have  been  now  received  in  all  lands, 
the  conquered  have  given  laws  to  the  conquerors ! " — [Civ.  Dei :  VI. :  11. 

XVII. :  p.  347. — "  For  there  is  not  any  city  of  the  Grecians,  nor  any 
of  the  barbarians,  nor  any  nation  whatsoever,  whither  our  custom  of 
resting  on  the  seventh  day  hath  not  come,  and  by  which  our  fasts  and 
lighting  up  lamps,  and  many  of  our  prohibitions  as  to  our  food,  are  not 
observed;  they  also  endeavour  to  imitate  our  mutual  concord  with 
one  another,  and  the  charitable  distribution  of  our  goods,  and  our  dili- 
gence in  our  trades,  and  our  fortitude  in  undergoing  the  distresses  we 
are  in,  on  account  of  our  laws ;  and  what  is  here  matter  of  the  greatest 
admiration,  our  law  hath  no  bait  of  pleasure  to  aUure  men  to  it,  but  it 
prevails  by  its  own  force ;  and  as  God  himself  pervades  all  the  world, 
so  hath  our  law  passed  through  all  the  world  also." — [Josephus:  "Adv. 
Apion  " :  II.  40. 

XVIII. :  p.  348. — "The  main  point  is,  that  Christianity  could  not 
have  become  that  imiversal  form  of  the  religious  consciousness  which 
it  is,  had  not  the  whole  development  of  the  world-history  up  to  the 
time  of  Christianity,— the  general  intellectual  culture  which  through 
the  Greeks  became  the  common  possession  of  the  nations,  the  uniting 
rule  of  the  Romans  over  peoples,  with  all  their  political  institutions 


036  APPENDIX. 

and  the  general  civilization  dependent  upon  these — had  not  this  broken 
through  the  barriers  of  the  sentiment  of  nationality,  and  dissolved 
much  which  had  divided  peoples  from  each  other,  setting  them  in  re- 
lations of  opposition  not  only  externally,  but  still  more  internally. 
The  universalism  of  Christianity  could  never  have  passed  over  into  the 
general  consciousness  of  the  nations,  except  it  had  had  the  pohticai 
universalism  for  its  steppmg-stone.  .  .  Both  religions  [Paganism  and 
Judaism]  had  in  this  way  made  room  for  a  new  religion  ;  and  if  we  re- 
gard  the  matter  from  the  stand-point  of  teleological  contemplation,  we 
can  only  consider  it  as  a  distinct  arrangement  of  Divine  Providence 
that  Christianity  should  step  forth  into  existence  before  men  at  precisely 
that  point  of  time  at  which  so  gi'eat  a  vacancy  was  to  be  filled  in  the 
religious  life  of  the  old  world.  .  .  Human  nature  has  a  need,  impos- 
sible of  denial,  for  the  recognition  of  the  supernatural,  and  for  com- 
munion with  it ;  and  the  general  prevalence  of  an  all-denjdng  unbelief 
only  calls  up  a  more  energetic  desire  for  faith.  So  also  there  lay  at  the 
root  of  a  great  part  of  superstition  a  need,  which  sought  for  the  satisfac- 
tion which  it  could  find  only  in  Christianity — the  need  of  redemption 
from  the  de6p-felt  discord  within,  and  of  reconciliation  with  the  un- 
known God,  toward  which  the  longing  aspiration  consciously  or  un- 
consciously was  reaching."  —  [F.  C.  Bam':  "Geschichte  der  Christ. 
Kirche";  Tubingen  ed.,  1863  :  Band  I.:  S.  5,  f. 

XIX. :  p.  349. — "  Wliat  the  Resurrection  was  in  itself,  lies  beyond 
the  sphere  of  historical  inquiry.  Historical  contemplation  has  only  to 
keep  itself  to  this  point :  that  for  the  faith  of  the  disciples  the  Resurrec- 
tion of  Jesus  became  the  most  fij^ed  and  incontrovertible  certamty. 
In  this  faith  Ciiristianity  first  secured  the  firm  foundation  of  its  his- 
torical development.  What  for  all  the  succeeding  history  is  the  indis- 
pensable basis  is  not  so  much  the  fact  itself  of  the  Resurrection  of  Jesus, 
as,  rather,  the  faith  in  that  fact.  .  .  No  psychological  analysis  can  enter 
into  the  interior  spiritual  process  through  which,  in  the  consciousness 
of  the  disciples,  their  faithlessness  in  presence  of  the  death  of  Jesus  was 
changed  into  their  conviction  of  his  Resurrection.  .  .  We  can  there- 
fore only  continue  to  stand  by  this :  that  for  them,  whatever  the  mter- 
vening  means  may  have  been,  the  Resurrection  of  Jesus  became  to 
their  consciousness  a  matter  of  fact,  and  possessed  for  them  all  the 
reality  of  a  historical  fact." — [F.  C.  Baur:  "Geschichte  der  Christ. 
Kirche":  Band  I.:  S.  39,  f. 

XX.:  p.  350. — "It  is  Christianity  alone  which,  as  the  religion  of 
humanity,  as  the  religion  of  no  caste,  of  no  chosen  people,  has  taught 
us  to  respect  the  histoiy  of  humanity,  as  a  whole ;  to  discover  the  tracer 


NOTES  TO  LECTURE  X,  63T 

of  a  divine  wisdom  and  love  in  the  government  of  all  the  races  of  man- 
kind, and  to  recognize,  if  possible,  in  even  the  lowest  and  crudest  forma 
of  religious  belief,  not  the  work  of  demoniacal  agencies,  but  something 
that  indicates  a  divine  guidance." — [Max  Mtlller:  "Science  of  Relig- 
ion"; New  York  ed.,  1872:  pp.  23-23. 

"Buddhism  has  succeeded  in  taming  barbarians,  and  still  shows  it 
seK  admirably  calculated  to  assist  in  maintaining  order  and  discipline; 
but  has  it  ever  supported  a  people  in  its  endeavours  after  progress,  in 
its  recuperative  efforts  when  smitten  by  disaster,  in  its  struggle 
against  despotism  ?  No  such  instances  are  known,  and  indeed  we  had 
no  right  to  expect  them.  Buddhism  does  not  measure  itseK  against 
this  or  that  abuse,  does  not  further  the  development  or  reformation  of 
society,  either  directly  or  indirectly,  for  the  very  simple  reason  that  it 
turns  away  from  the  world  on  principle.  Let  us  reckon  fully  with 
the  meaning  and  the  ultimate  consequences  of  this  principle.  It  must 
and  does  result  in  absolute  quietism — ^nay,  even  indifferentism." — 
[Kuenen:  "  National  and  Universal  Eeligions  ";  New  York  ed.,  1882: 
pp.  299-300. 

XXI. :  p.  351. — "  All  the  evidences  of  Christianity  may  be  traced  to 
this  great  principle, — that  every  effect  must  have  an  adequate  cause. 
We  claim  for  our  religion  a  divine  original,  because  no  adequate  cause 
for  it  can  be  found  in  the  powers  or  passions  of  human  nature,  or  in 
the  circumstances  under  which  it  appeared;  because  it  can  only  be 
accounted  for  by  the  interposition  of  that  Being,  to  whom  its  first 
preachers  universally  ascribed  it,  and  with  whose  nature  it  perfectly 
agrees."— [Dr.  Channing  :  Works;  Vol.3:  pp.  119-120. 

"Remove  from  Christianity  every  thing  in  it  which  is  supernatural 
and  divine,  and  then  the  problem  which  we  have  to  do  with  is  this : — 
A  revolution  in  human  affairs,  in  the  highest  degree  beneficial  in  its 
import,  was  carried  forward  upon  the  arena  of  the  great  world,  by 
means  of  the  noble  behaviour  of  men  who  command  our  sympathy  and 
admu^ation,  as  brave,  wise,  and  good.  But  this  revolution  drew  the 
whole  of  its  moral  force  from  a  Belief,  which — how  shall  we  designate 
it  ? — was  in  part  an  inexplicable  illusion ;  in  part  a  dream,  and  in  large 
part  a  fraud !  This,  the  greatest  forward  moment  which  the  civilizeo 
branches  of  the  human  family  have  ever  made,  took  its  rise  in  be- 
wildered Jewish  brains !  Indestructible  elements  of  advancement,  to 
which  even  infidel  nations  confessedly  owe  whatever  is  best  and  mo»t 
hopeful  within  them,  these  elements  of  good,  which  were  obtained  for 
us  at  so  vast  a  cost,  had  their  source  in  a  congeries  of  exaggerations, 
and  in  a  mindless  conspiracy,  hatched  by  chance,  nursed  by  imposture, 
and  wiaged  by  fanaticism !  "—[Isaac  Taylor  :  ' '  Restoration  of  Belief  "  ^ 
Boston  ed.,  1867  :  pp.  104-5. 


638  APPENDIX. 

XXII.:  p.  351. — "Just  as,  according  to  the  Bialuninica.  tlieory, 
each  of  the  Indian  sacred  rivers  loses  in  time  its  sanctity,  so  India  itsell 
is  gradually  losing  every  thing  which  is  characteristic  of  it.  I  may 
illustrate  the  completeness  of  the  transformation  which  is  proceeding 
by  repeating  what  I  have  learned,  on  excellent  authority,  to  be  the 
opinion  of  the  best  native  scholars :  that  in  fifty  years  all  knowledge  of 
Sanscrit  will  have  departed  from  India,  or,  if  kept  alive,  will  be  kept 
alive  by  the  reactive  infl.uence  of  Germany  and  England." — [Sir  H.  S. 
Maine  :  "Village  Communities";  London  ed.,  1871  :  pp.  24-5. 

Yet  this  is  the  language  which  that  all-accomplished  scholar,  Sir 
William  Jones,  described  as  "  more  perfect  than  the  Greek,  more  copious 
than  the  Latin,  and  more  exquisitely  refined  than  either." — [Works  : 
Vol.  3  :  p.  34. 

XXIII.:  p.  352. — "Mankind,  moving  solemnly  on  its  appointed 
road,  from  age  to  age,  passes  by  its  imperfect  teachers,  guided  by  their 
light,  blessed  by  their  toil,  and  sprinkled  with  their  blood.  But  Truth, 
like  her  God,  is  before  and  above  us  forever.  So  we  joass  by  the  lamps 
of  the  street,  with  wonder  at  their  light,  though  but  a  smoky  glare ; 
they  seem  to  change  places,  and  burn  dim  in  the  distance  as  we  go  on ; 
at  last  the  solid  walls  of  darkness  shut  them  in.  But  high  over  our 
heads  are  the  unsullied  stars,  which  never  change  their  place,  nor  dim 
their  eye.  So  the  truths  of  the  Scriptures  will  teach  forever,  though 
the  record  perish,  and  its  authors  be  unknown.  They  came  from  God, 
through  the  soul  of  man." — [Theodore  Parker  :  "Discoui'se  of  Relig- 
ion"; Boston  ed.,  1843  :  p.  376. 

"  The  grand  objects  of  the  physical  univeree,  discernible  from  every 
latitude,  look  in  at  the  understanding  of  all  nations,  and  secure  the 
unity  of  Science.  And  the  glorious  persons  of  human  history,  imper- 
ishable from  the  traditions  of  every  civilized  people,  keeping  their 
sublime  glance  upon  the  Conscience  of  ages,  create  the  unity  of  Faith. 
And  if  it  hath  pleased  God  the  Creator  to  fit  up  one  system  with  one 
Sun,  to  make  the  daylight  of  several  worlds :  so  may  it  fitly  have 
pleased  God  the  Revealer  to  kindle  amid  the  ecliptic  of  history  One 
Divine  Soul,  to  glorify  whatever  lies  within  the  great  year  of  his  mor- 
al Providence,  and  represent  the  Father  of  Lights.  The  exhibition  of 
Christ  as  his  Moral  Image  has  maintained  in  the  souls  of  men  a  com- 
mon spiritual  type,  to  correct  the  aberrations  of  their  individuality,  to 
unite  the  humblest  and  the  highest,  to  merge  aU  minds  into  one  fami- 
ly,— and  t"hat  the  family  of  God. " — [James  Martineau :  ' '  Miscellanies  " 
Boston  e<l.,  1852  :  p.  280. 


IfOTBS  TO  LECTURE  X  639 

XXI Y.  Finis.— The  clearest  prophetic  judgment  of  the  Jewish 
Church,  in  the  days  which  heard  the  first  proclamation  of  Christianity, 
could  have  been  expressed  by  no  other  so  well  and  so  wisely  as  by  Ga, 
maliel: — "His  learning  was  so  eminent,  and  his  character  so  revered, 
that  he  is  one  of  the  seven  who  alone  among  Jewish  doctors  have  been 
honored  with  the  title  of  '  Rabban. '  As  Aquinas,  among  the  schoolmen, 
was  called  Doctor  Angelicus,  and  Bonaventura  Doctor  Seraphicus^  so 
Gamaliel  was  called  the  '  Beauty  of  the  Law ' ;  and  it  is  a  saying  of  the 
Talmud,  that  *  since  Rabban  Gamaliel  died,  the  glory  of  the  Law  has 
ceased.'  .  .  He  lived  and  died  a  Jew ;  and  a  well-known  prayer  against 
Christian  heretics  was  composed  or  sanctioned  by  him.  .  .  Another  of 
his  pupils,  Onkelos,  the  author  of  the  celebrated  Targum,  raised  to 
him  such  a  funeral  pile  of  rich  materials  as  had  never  before  been 
known,  except  at  the  burial  of  a  king." — [Conybeare  and  Howson  • 
"Life  and  Epistles  of  St.  Paul";  Vol.  L  :  pp.  61-63. 

The  rich  funeral  pile  was  speedily  dispersed  into  wind-strewed  ashes. 
The  son  and  successor  of  Gamaliel  perished  amid  the  destruction  of  Je- 
rusalem. The  principal  hold  which  the  father  has  had  on  the  mem- 
ory of  the  world  has  been  through  his  early  relation  as  Teacher  to  that 
young  Paul  whom  he  had  to  count  afterward  among  the  '  apostates,'  con- 
cerning whom  he  had  prayed  that  for  them  there  might  be  "no  hope." 
But  he  spoke  certain  words,  on  one  occasion,  to  which  the  writings  of 
those  whom  he  despised  have  given  an  earthly  immortality :  on  which 
all  the  succeeding  centuries  have  made  their  steady  and  mighty  com- 
ment: to  which  the  expanding  Christendom  of  to-day  presents  its  an- 
swer: which  unbelief  may  well  thoughtfully  ponder:  and  which  the 
humblest  Christian  disciple  may  joyfully  accept,  as  he  expects  the  com- 
ing ages : — 

"  Then  stood  there  up  one  in  the  council,  a  Pharisee,  named  Gama- 
liel, a  doctor  of  the  law,  had  in  reputation  among  all  the  people,  and 
commanded  to  put  the  apostles  forth  a  little  space;  and  said  unto 
them.  Ye  men  of  Israel,  take  heed  to  yourselves  what  ye  intend  to  do 
as  touching  these  men.  For  before  these  days  rose  up  Theudas,  boasting 
himself  to  be  somebody;  to  whom  a  number  of  men,  about  four  hun- 
dred, joined  themselves :  who  was  slain ;  and  all,  as  many  as  obeyed 
him,  were  scattered,  and  brought  to  nought.  After  this  man  rose  up 
Judas  of  Galilee  in  the  days  of  the  taxing,  and  drew  away  much  people 
after  him :  he  also  perished ;  and  all,  even  as  many  as  obeyed  him, 
were  dispersed.  And  now  I  say  unto  you.  Refrain  from  these  men, 
and  let  them  alone :  for  if  this  counsel  or  this  work  be  of  men,  it  will 
come  to  nought;  but  if  it  be  of  God,  ye  cannot  overthrow  it;  lest 
haply  ye  be  found  even  to  fight  against  God  "I— ["The  Acts  of  the 
Apostles";  V.:  34-39. 


INDEX 


Abbott,  on  the  date  of  the  fourth  Gospel, 

361. 
Abelard,  242,  559,  562. 
Absolon,  Archbishop,  his  monastery  the 

site  of  Copenhagen,  Montalembert  quoted, 

496. 
Abuses  of    Christianity  by  some    of    its 

adherents,  15-17,  26,  27,  279.     Symonds 

quoted,  369. 
Adalbert  of  Prague,  his  death,  306. 
Adam  of  St.  Victoire,  119. 
Adrian,  Popes,  IV.  and  VI.,  their  origin, 

167,  495- 
Adumbrations,    going    before,    of    the 

Light ;  unconscious  prophecies,  334,  335. 

Jones  quoted,  628,  629.     See  Maxims. 
i^scHYLUS     on    the    recompense    of    the 

guilty,  55;   quoted,  403.     War,    "Seven 

against  Thebes,"  quoted,  524.     Fatality, 

in  the  legend  of  Prometheus,  288 ;  note 

on  Nemesis  by  Symonds,  598.     Woman, 

"Seven    against    Thebes,"    and    Grote 

quoted,   473.     Incidental  references,   72, 

214,  232,  502,  527. 
Agnostic  scheme,  71. 
Agrarian  Law,  the  basis  of  the  Hebrew 

civil  constitution,  76. 

Agrippina,  579. 

Aguesseau,  Chancellor  d' ;  and  the  droit 
(VAuhaine^  515. 

Alexander  the  Great,  his  career,  342,  343 ; 
Plutarch  quoted,  632.  References  to,  290, 
297,  502,  542,  610. 

Alexander  III.  condemns  slavery  and 
maintains  the  rights  of  the  people,  167 ; 
Voltaire  quoted,  496. 

Alexander,  Mrs.  C.  F.,  verses  on  the  Fall 
of  Pagan  Rome,  quoted,  614,  615. 

Allobroges,  293. 

Alpheus  of  Mitylene,  quoted,  289. 

Ambassadors  in  Christendom,  196.  For- 
mer functions  of,  Woolsey  quoted,  513. 
Voltaire,  514.  Origin  of  the  office.  Ward 
quoted,  514.  Their  treatment  in  former 
times,  Rambaud  and  Creasy  quoted,  514, 
515. 

Ambrose,  St.,  his  chants,  131 ;  Hawkins 
quoted,  446.  His  hymns  and  psalms, 
Augustine  quoted,  447.  Ref-yences  to, 
117,  119,  153. 


Ammianus  Marcellinus ;  his  Roman  history 

quoted,  442,  503,  549,  605. 
Amphictyonic  Assembly,  180;  its  origin 

and  purpose ;    Grote    referred    to,    and 

Curtius  quoted,  502. 
Ancient  religions,  their  historical  interest, 

36,  37.     See  Ethnic  religions. 
Animism,   123.    Definition  of,   by   Tiele, 

454;   Cicero  and  Dollinger  quoted,  454, 

455.   The  Turanian  creed,  Taylor  quoted, 

427. 
Anniceris  ransoms  Plato  from    slavery, 

156 ;  Zeller  and  Felton  quoted,  479. 
Anschar,  or  Anskar,  306,  307.    Authoi 

of    the   Biblia  Pauper um^    Humphreys 

quoted,  550.     His  life  and  work.  Smith 

quoted,  617. 
Anselm,  St.,  236. 
Antagonists  of  Christianity,  8;  Parker 

and  Strauss  quoted,  365. 
Anthropomorphism,  in  the  Hebrew  and 

Christian  faiths,  46. 
Anthropos,  37.     Etymology  of  the  word, 

Miiller  quoted,  381. 
Anthusa,  153. 
Antigone,  288. 

Antinous,  256.     Obelisk  in  honor  of,  574. 
Antioch,    heathen    worship    in.    Gibbon 

quoted,   38.     Antiphonal  chants  in  the 

Christian  church  first  introduced  there ; 

Socrates  :  Eccl.  History  quoted,  445. 
Antiochus  III.,  298. 
Antoninus.    See  Marcus  AureUus. 
Antoninus  Pius,  142. 
Apicius,  gluttony  of,  254.   See  Gluttony. 
Apollonius  of  Tyana,  219.     Account  of, 

by  Philostratus,  535.     Referred  to,  558. 

Apostles'  Creed,  120 ;  Schaff  and  Luther 
quoted,  451. 

Apostolical   Constitutions,  465,  489, 

490.  494,  557,  589- 
Appetite,    fantastic    indulgence    of,    in 

ancient  times,  254 ;  notes^  569. 
Apuleius,    38.     "Daemon   of  Socrates" 

quoted,  382.     Reference  to,  461. 
Aquila,  593. 
Aquinas,  119,  236,  639. 
Aratus  quoted,  331,  611, 
(641) 


642 


INDEX. 


Arbitration,  International ;  schemes  of 
Henry  IV. ,  and  others,  206 ;  notes,  525, 
526. 

Arcadius,  157. 

Aretino,  his  service  to  modem  music,  446. 

Argument  and  Dogma,  15 ;  Newman 
quoted,  368. 

Aristeides,  274. 

Aristippus,  Plutarch  quoted,  560. 

Aristophanes,  42,  473,  572.  "Birds" 
quoted,  392  ;  "  Clouds,"  385. 

Aristotle,  49,  50,  74,  91,  140,  148,  155, 
156,  181,  188,  568.  Quoted  by  Josephus, 
and  Origen,  401 ;  by  Laertius,  420 ;  by 
Athenaeus,  479.  Politics  quoted,  157, 
411,  461,  483,  515.  Nico.  Ethics,  422, 
494.     Poetic,  467.     Economics,  478. 

Arnold,  Matthew,  quoted ;  Poems,  263, 
582.  St.  Paul  and  Protestauitism,  541. 
Literature  and  Dogma,  624. 

Arria,  Pliny's  mention  of  her,  472. 

Art  and  Christianity,  232-235.  Christian 
art  in  the  Catacombs,  232 ;  notes,  Rossi, 
Liibke,  Tyrwhitt,  Pressense,  551.  Mo- 
saics, 233,  Hodgkin  quoted,  552.  Archi- 
tecture of  St.  Mark's,  Ruslan  quoted, 
553- 

AsPASiA,  oration  ascribed  to  her,  468. 

Astarte,  39. 

Astrology,  Cicero  referred  to,  295. 

Astronomy,  and  Eternity  of  God,  50. 

Athanasius,  305.  Socrates :  Eccl.  History 
quoted,  616. 

Atheism  and  Buddhism,  128 ;  notes,  Dunck- 
er,  Barth,  Hardy,  Legge,  389;  Bigan- 
det,  457.  Plutarch  on  Atheism,  397. 
Christians  called  Atheists ;  notes,  Justin 
Martyr,  434;  Roma  Sotterranea  and 
Gibbon,  591,  592.  Gibbon's  characteriza- 
tion of  the  Roman  Caesars,  508.  See  In- 
fidelity. 

Athen^us,  38,  436.  His  Deipnosophistae 
quoted,  148,  156,  383,  406,  476,  479. 

Athenagoras  :  Plea  for  Christians  quoted, 
457- 

Atossa,  502. 

Auguries,  portents  and  omens,  294-296 ; 
notes,  Plutarch,  Tacitus,  DoUinger,  Am- 
mianus  Marcellinus,  Uhlhorn,  603-606. 
Reference  to,  309. 

Augusta,  602. 

Augustine,  Saint,  on  Christ,  304.  His 
De  Civitate  Dei  written,  305,  his  ac- 
count quoted,  617.  On  Faith,  368. 
On  false  gods,  40;  Varro  aud  Seneca 
quoted  by  him,  386.  On  sacrilegious 
entertainments,  434.  On  hymns,  117, 
quoted,  447.  On  marriage,  476.  Mean- 
ing of  slave,  156,  quoted,  479.  On 
Monnica,  153,  quoted,  489.  On  War. 
«oi,  518.      On   Plato,  232,   quoted  547. 


On  Seneca,  253,  quoted,  568.  On  th« 
saying — Drought  and  Christianity,  584, 
On  the  Gospel  of  Christ,  502,  quoted, 
608.  On  the  Jews,  335,  quoted,  629, 
635.  On  the  good  in  heathenism,  335, 
quoted,  629.  On  the  growth  of  his  mind, 
346,  Neander  quoted,  634.  The  De  Civi^ 
tate  Dei  quoted,  156,  219,  252,  386,  434, 
448,  479,  547,  568,  584,  608,  629,  635. 
Epist.  262,  518.  Co}i/essions,  447,  490, 
585.  Catechizing  0/  the  unlearned,  535. 
Christiatt  Doctrine,  547.  Retractations, 
617.  Ps,  exit.  629.  Against  the  Do7ta- 
tists,  629.  Incidental  references,  236 
308,  314,  328. 

Augustus,  deification  of,  43 ;  notes,  Sue- 
tonius, Ozanam,  Bryce,  394,  395.  Legal- 
izes concubinage,  151 ;  Troplong  quoted, 
473.  His  simplicity  of  living,  252  ;  Sue- 
tonius quoted,  567.  Taxes  the  unmarried, 
255.  Burns  so-called  prophetical  writ- 
ings, 293  ;  Suetonius  quoted,  603. 

Auramazda,  quoted,  436. 

Aureltan,  258,  576.  Offers  prisoners  for 
expiatory  sacrifice,  Suetonius  and  D61- 
linger  quoted,  441. 

AVESTA,  Zoroastrian,  218,  quoted,  80,  414  ; 
Account  of,  Duncker  and  Haug  quoted, 
532.  Miiller  and  Haug,  364,  365.  See 
Parsees,  Zoroaster,  Sacred  books. 

Bacon  on  the  Christian  Faitli,  his  De  Aug- 
mentis  quoted,  200.  On  prophecy,  298  ; 
quoted,  606.  Advises  Grotius  in  regard 
to  the  Law  of  Nations,  Mackenzie  quoted, 
509- 

Bajazet,  his  slaughter  of  captives,  176; 
Creasy  quoted,  500. 

Bancroft's  History  of  the  United  States 
quoted,  621. 

Barnabas,  Epistle  of,  quoted,  464. 

Barth  :  Religions  of  India  quoted,  363, 
389,  412,  413,  437,  438,  529,  530,  628. 

Basil  :  Evening  Hymn  of  the  fourth 
century  transmitted  by  him,  119;  trans- 
lation of,  notes,  450.  Advocates  the 
study  of  Greek  literature,  231  ;  quoted, 
546.  Reference  to  his  description  of 
scenery  and  of  forest  life,  Humboldt's 
Cosmos  quoted,  555.  First  hospitals  in 
Asia  founded  by  him,  591.  Incidental 
references,  117,  152,  153,  446,  452. 

Basilides,  594. 

Battle.    See  War. 

Bauer  on  the  fourth  Gospel,  361.  Hig 
theory,  Godet  quoted,  625.  His  theory 
of  Christianity,  338. 

Baur  on  the  fourth  Gospel,  361,  363.  On 
Christianity,  379,  635,  636.  On  St.  Paul, 
540. 

Bayle  on  the  Gospel,  615, 

Becker,  his  Charicles  quoted,  462.  Gal' 
lus,  575. 


INDEX. 


64:3 


Bede,  558,  577.  His  death,  308;  Cuth- 
bert  quoted,  619,  620.  On  preaching, 
557.     On  Columba,  618. 

Bellarmine,  446. 

Belligerent  rights  in  ancient  times,  174, 
17s  ;  notes ^  Hadley,  Xenophon,  Thucy- 
dides,  Livy,  Tacitus,  Creasy,  Menzies, 
498,  499.  In  Europe  in  1871,  175.  Law 
of  reprisals,  202 ;  noteSy  Bluntschh, 
Woolsey,  520. 

Benevolence,  systematic ;  to  the  poor 
and  afflicted,  under  Christianity,  and  in 
ancient  Greece  and  Rome,  272-274 ; 
notes ^  588-591. 

Bentham,  206,  526. 

Bernard  :  his  influence  and  work,  183  ; 
notesy  Neander,  Calvin,  505,  506.  Inci- 
dental references,  153,  559,  631. 

Bhagavad-Gita  ;  account  of  Krishna 
from  the,  627. 

Bible  ;  its  date  and  authorship,  3 ;  notes^ 
361 :  215,  216 ;  notes^  528  :  221,  222.  Its 
facts  and  truths,  3 ;  Coleridge  quoted, 
362.  The  claim  for  it  of  Divine  origin, 
5-7.  The  Sacred  Books  of  other  re- 
ligions, see  Sacred  Books.  The  Bible 
presented  to  the  faith  and  intellectual 
mastery  of  mankind,  219-223 ;  notes^ 
Augustine,  Origen,  Huxley,  Parker,  535- 

537.  Its  tendency  to  exalt  the  mental 
faculty,  and  to  build  up  a  sagacious, 
middle-class  mind,  a  source  of  strength 
to  the  state,  223,  224,  The  contrast  under 
the  ancient  ethnic  religions,  224 ;  notes^ 
Mommsen,  Mill,  Pressense,  Cicero,  537, 

538.  Its  inspiriting  force  on  thought  and 
study,  225-227;  notesy  539-543-  The 
supernatural  element  in  it,  227,  228.  Its 
silences  upon  themes  on  which  philosophy 
loves  to  speculate ;  the  variety  of  intel- 
lectual work  inspired  by  it,  228-234 ; 
MoteSy  544-553.  Its  stimulating  power 
upon  the  higher  intellectual  nature,  235, 
236;  notes^  554-557.  The  wide  range  of 
study  prompted  by  it,  237-240 ;  notes, 
558?  559-  Its  effect  upon  general  educa- 
tion, 240-242 ;  notes,  561-563.  Its  en- 
during effects  upon  persons  and  peoples, 
244,  245  ;  Whitney  quoted,  565.  Review 
of  the  subject,  324.  Resemblances  be- 
tween the  language  used  in  the  Old  and 
New  Testament  Scriptures,  and  that  used 
in  Apocryphal  books,  339,  340;  note  on 
Philo,  631.  The  Bible  and  the  Rig- Veda 
contrasted,  Miiller  quoted,  414.  See 
Gospels. 

BiGANDET,  Legend  of  Gaudama  quoted, 
128,  243,  363,  457,  564. 

Bingham's  Antiquities  quoted,  446,  449. 
Blanche  of  Castile,  153. 

Bland!NA,    martyrdom    of,    275  ;    notes, 

Eusebius,  Renan,  593. 
Blount,  535. 


Bluntschli,  his  "Das  Modeme  Volkem 
recht "  quoted,  506,  507,  520,  521. 

Boeckh,  his  "Pub.  Economy  of  Athens'* 

quoted,  481,  484. 
Bolingbroke,  566. 
Bologna  schools,  153. 

BONAVENTURA,  639. 

Books  of  Hours,  and  Hours  of  Prayer,  122. 
Described,  Palmer  and  the  Huth  cata- 
logue quoted,  453,  454, 

BOSSUET,  368,  618. 

Bowditch,  230,  544. 

Brace,  his  Gesta  Christi  quoted,  516,  518, 
561. 

Bradford,  his  Plimouth  Plantation  quoted, 
621, 

Brahma,  his  nature,  Jacob  quoted,  456. 

BrAhmanas,  217 ;  notes,  Whitney,  Barth, 
Tiele,  Miiller,  529 ;  referred  to,  242.  The 
rules  of  sacrifice,  Duncker  quoted,  437. 
No  holy  places,  Barth  quoted,  628.  Sea 
Vedas. 

Brahmanic  system,  its  conception  of  a 
Supreme  Being,  51,  55,  70.  Whitney 
quoted,  405.  Jacob,  456.  Man  under  it, 
74 ;  notes,  Jones,  Duncker,  411.  Caste, 
74>  75  ;  notes,  Barth,  Duncker,  412.  It3 
tone  of  questioning  doubt,  and  its  wor- 
ship, 80,  Maurice  and  the  Rig- Veda 
quoted,  414.  Its  doctrine  of  the  transmi- 
gration of  souls,  289,  Whitney  quoted, 
599.    See  Vedas. 

Br^beuf,  founder  of  the  Huron  mission, 
Parkman  quoted,  444. 

Bryce,  his  "Holy  Roman  Empire" 
quoted,  395,  505,  553. 

Buddha,  his  personality  and  his  revelations, 
notes,  Hardy,  Legend  of  Gaudama,  363. 
His  life,  St.  Hilaire  quoted,  627.  Tha 
tradition  of  his  earlier  existences,  70, 
Duncker  quoted,  409.  Promises  salva- 
tion to  all,  75,  Miiller  quoted,  412.  Not 
a  social  reformer,  notes,  Barth,  Olden- 
burg, 413.  His  wish  to  assume  the  sin 
of  the  world,  and  his  atheism,  128,  332, 
Miiller  quoted,  457. 

Buddhism,  recognizes  no  personal  Deity, 
41 ;  notes,  Duncker,  Barth,  Hardy,  389. 
Its  revolt  against  Brahmanism,  sympathy 
with  man,  but  maintenance  of  caste,  75  ; 
notes,  Miiller,  Barth,  Oldenburg,  412, 
413.  Nirvana,  92  ;  notes,  Burnouf, 
Davids,  Miiller,  428.  A  religion  without 
sacrifice,  106.  Its  theory  of  light  and 
wisdom,  and  its  pantheism,  128.  Buddha 
and  sin,  128,  332,  Miiller  quoted,  457. 
Its  sacred  books,  217 ;  Barth  quoted, 
530.  See  Vedas.  Its  doctrine  of  the 
transmigration  of  souls,  289,  Whitney 
quoted,  599.  The  nearest  of  the  ethnic 
systems  to  Christianity,  281,  282.  Its 
moral  code,  332  ;  notes,  the  Dhammapa* 


644 


INDEX, 


da,  Muller,  626,  627.  Krishna,  his  mis- 
sion, 332;  the  Bhagavad-Gitd  quoted, 
627,  628. 

BUNSEN  quoted,  God  in  History,  373,  450. 
Christianity  and  Mankind,  443. 

BURCKHARDT  quoted,  553. 

BURIGNY,  his  Life  of  Grotius  quoted,  510. 

Burke  quoted,  180,  204,  205,  523. 

Burmese  prayer,  Bigandet  quoted,  457. 

Burn,  his  Rome  and  the  Campagna 
quoted,  567. 

BURNEY,  his  History  of  Music  quoted,  444. 

BURNOUF  on  Nirv4»a,  92,  his  "  Buddhisme 
Indien  "  quoted,  428. 

^URRHUS,  253. 

$UTLER,  236. 
C-iECILIUS,  435. 

CiECiLius  Isidorus,  480. 

C^SAR,  42,  43,  91,  259,  294,  440,  486,  499> 

542,  576,     Gibbon's  characterization  of 

the  Roman  Caesars,  188,  508. 
Cairns  on  International  Law,  507. 
Caius  Melissus,  479. 
Caldwell,  564. 
Caligula,  187, 297.  On  Seneca's  eloquence, 

41. 
Calixtus  I.,  491. 
Callixtus,    Saint,   591.    The    Callixtine 

Cemetery,  232. 
Calpurnia,  sacrificed  by  her  father,  Mari- 

us  ;  Plutarch  quoted,  442. 
Calpurnia,     Pliny's    wife,    150.      Pliny 

quoted,  472. 
Calvin,  on  St.  Bernard,  506. 
Calvus,  the  orator,  567,  575. 
Cambridge,  university  of,  its  origin,  242, 

563. 
Carlyle  quoted,  9,  430, 
Carthage,   and  the    statue  of  Chronos ; 

sacrifice  of  children,  108,  440, 
Cassiodorus  on  the  Organ,  Montalembert 

quoted,  446. 
Caste,  74,  75.     Barth  quoted,  412. 
Catacombs,   Christian    art    in,   232,  233 ; 

notes,  Northcote's  Rossi,  Tyrwhitt,  Pres- 

sense,  550-552.     Places  of  resort,  Rossi 

quoted,  427.    Implements  of  daily  labor 

pictured  in  them,  Pressense  quoted,  538. 

Epitaphs  on  immortality  in,  Rossi  quoted, 

587.     Violated,  and  use  forbidden,  304, 

Rossi :  Roma  Sotterranea  quoted,  612. 

Cato,  149,  i57i  241,  252, 256,  470,  483,  561, 

568,  571,  633. 
Catullus,  482. 
^elsus,  265,  535.    Quoted  by  Origen,  457, 

527,  608. 


Channing  on  War  referred  to,  200.  Oo 
Christ,  377.  On  the  miracles,  371.  On 
Christianity,  367,  417,  566,  630,  637.  On 
music,  448. 

Chappell's  History  of  Music  quoted,  445. 

Charlemagne,  30,  207,  504,  516,  517,  561, 
618. 

Charles  v.,  his  treaty  with  Francis  I.  vio- 
lated by  the  latter,  Robertson  and  Gui« 
zot  quoted,  513. 

Charles  XII.,  his  treatment  of  KhUkof, 
ambassador  of  Russia,  515. 

Childebert,  307. 

Childhood  in  Rome  and  Greece,  and 
other  states,  in  ancient  times,  138-141, 
notes,  460-462.  Later,  in  Rome,  afifected 
by  Christianity,  142,  notes,  463.  Among 
the  Hebrews,  143.  Under  Christianity, 
144-146,  notes,  464,  465. 

Children  sacrificed  in  ancient  times,  108, 
notes,  440,  441.  Euripides  on  the  charm 
of  children,  Symond's  Greek  Poets  quoted, 
587. 

Chiliastic  speculations,  301. 

China,  its  Sacred  books,  217,  Tiele  quoted, 
531.  Confucius  [Kong-tse],  his  sayings, 
363.  His  religious  doctrine,  364,  His 
worship,  363,  364,  436.  His  doctrine  of 
God,  389.  Golden  Rule  inculcated  by 
him,  notes,  Thornton,  Legge,  419,  Jones, 
628,  629.  His  teaching,  429.  On  woman, 
469.  References  to  him,  7,  86,  112,  149, 
217,  363,  364,  389,  419.  436,  469,  531,  628. 
Lao-tse,  account  of,  364.  References  to, 
7,  217,  364.  Miiller's  reference  to  the 
work  of  Dr.  Legge  on  the  Chinese  Clas- 
sics, 564.  The  Chinese  Classics  quoted, 
363,  364,  389,  419.  429,  -169,  564.  China 
without  epic,  art,  or  living  literature,  244. 
Woman  in  China,  148,  149,  ?iotes,  Legge, 
Schlegel,  469.  Chinese  notion  of  happi- 
ness, Schlegel  quoted,  469.  Hospitals 
unknown  in  China,  Mores  Catholici 
quoted,  591. 

Christ,  His  appearance  in  the  world,  3,  4. 
Three  views  of  His  nature  and  authority, 
II,  12.  His  miracles,  20,  21  ;  notes,  ■yi'^t 
371.  Prophecies  concerning  Him,  22,  23  ; 
notes,  372-374.  His  Divine  spirit  as  ex- 
hibited in  the  Scriptures,  24-26 ;  notes, 
315~3n-  His  intolerance  of  sin,  and  His 
Divine  purity,  53,  54.  The  imparting  of 
His  spirit  to  man,  58.  The  meaning  of 
His  Incarnation  to  those  who  accept  Him 
as  Divine,  59.  '^ATien  accepted  as  the 
perfect  representative  of  the  Infinite 
Father,  59.  The  Love  in  God  toward 
man,  made  familiar  through  Jesus,  and 
its  beneficent  effects,  60-63  ;  Martineau 
quoted,  408.  The  boundaries  of  the  per- 
sonal ministry  of  Christ,  79.  The  plan, 
indicated  before,  and  consummated  in 
His  advent,  83,  84;  Schaff  quoted,  416. 
The  solicitation,  to  each  individual  mind, 


INDEX. 


645 


for  the  voluntary  acceptance  of  His  re- 
ligion, 85,  86.  Channing  quoted,  417. 
His  spiritual  persuasions,  and  recognition 
of  man's  intellectual  nature,  and  of  his 
capacity  for  affection,  86-90 ;  Newman 
quoted,  418  ;  Parker  quoted,  420.  The 
supernatural  elements  of  His  advent, 
death  and  resurrection,  and  their  interpre- 
tation, 93, 94  ;  Stanley  and  Taylor  quoted, 
429.  The  Divine  nature  and  the  human 
in  His  person,  97;  Pascal  quoted,  430. 
His  sacrifice,  109,  110  ;  Taylor,  and  Canon 
of  Trent  quoted,  442.  The  new  element 
of  love,  the  fruit  of  the  Master's  mission, 
expressed  in  worship,  115.  Obliteration 
from  the  knowledge  of  man,  of  places  as- 
sociated with  the  ministry  of  Christ  in  the 
world,  124,  125 ;  Renan  quoted,  455. 
Christ  and  children,  144,  145  ;  Irenseus 
quoted,  464.  The  universal  spiritual 
Kingdom  announced  by  Him,  208.  The 
silences  of  the  Scriptures  on  questions  of 
constant  speculation  concerning  the  Mas- 
ter, 229.  His  law  of  purity  and  the  Ser- 
mon on  the  Mount,  266  ;  Taylor  quoted, 
585.  Christ  the  personal  Head  of  the 
religion,  267-270 ;  Taylor,  and  Minucius 
FeUx  quoted,  586.  The  virtues  exempli- 
fied in  Him,  271.  Renan  on  the  spirit  of 
Jesus,  278.  Picture  of  Christ  presented 
in  the  Gospels,  299 ;  Neander  quoted, 
607.  His  religion  new,  and  apart  from 
every  other,  340-342  ;  Channing,  and  Re- 
nan quoted,  630  ;  with  a  capacity  for  self- 
xesurrection,  349  ;  Baur  quoted,  636  :  and 
Divine,  in  the  transcendent  sense,  352 ; 
Martineau  quoted,  638.  Christ  the  Light 
of  the  World,  356.  The  Golden  Rule  of 
Christ  compared  with  similar  precepts  in 
ethnic  religions,  419,  Christ  and  Ma- 
homet, 616.  Christ  and  Buddha,  627. 
The  Palatine  Graphite,  its  supposed  ref- 
erence to  Christ,  104 ;  notes^  435. 

C  dRiSTiANiTY  :  Lecture  I.— External  evi- 
ience  for  Christianity  as  Divifie,  the 
value  and  limitations  of  its  probative 
^orce,  3-32  ;  notes,  361-380. 

Articulate  through  the  Gospels  and 
Epistles,  5.  Its  paramount  claim  of  Di- 
vine origin,  5,  7.  Antagonists  of,  8 ; 
notes,  Parker,  Strauss,  365.  Its  nature, 
10-13  ;  Lactantius  quoted,  366.  Experi- 
ence the  only  final  evidence  for  it,  13,  14  ; 
notes,  Coleridge,  Channing,  Maurice, 
367,  368.  Based  on  Faith,  14,  15  ;  notes, 
Newman,  Bossuet,  Augustine,  Perrone, 
36S.  Evil  wrought  by  some  of  its  ad- 
herents, 15-17,  26  ;  Symonds  quoted,  369. 
Addressed  to  the  spirit,  not  to  the  sense, 
19  ;  Martineau  and  Pascal  quoted  on  the 
perception  of  truth,  369.  The  Miracles, 
20,  21;  notes,  Mme.  de  Stael,  Origen, 
Locke,  Pascal,  Coleridge,  Goethe,  Chan- 
ning, Taylor,  369-371.  The  Prophecies, 
22,  23 ;  notes,  Cicero,  Justin  Martyr,  Ire- 
naeus,  Jones,  Schleiermacher,  De  Wette, 
Stanley,  Pascal,  372-374.    Its  Founder, 


see  Christ.  Its  historical  effects  com- 
pared with  those  of  otlier  systems,  26-28  ; 
notes^  MuUer,  Martineau,  Maurice,  378. 
Nature  of  the  evidence  required  to  indi* 
cate  the  Divine  origin  of  Christianity,  28- 
32  ;  notes,  Coleridge,  Ewald,  Baur,  ^•• 
vigny,  Rowe,  Lecky,  378-380. 

Lecture  IL. — The  new  conception  oj 
God,  introduced  by  Christianity,  35-63, 
notes,  381-408. 

The  religious  condition  of  the  world  at 
the  time  of  the  appearance  of  Christianity; 
37-44  ;  notes,  382-396.  Its  historical  con- 
nection with  the  past,  45,  Pascal  quoted, 
45.  The  new  conception  of  God  intro- 
duced by  it :  His  Personality,  45-47.  His 
Unity,  47-49.  Resemblances  in  other  re- 
ligions to  the  doctrine  of  the  unity  of 
God,  47,  48 ;  notes,  Dollinger,  Haug, 
398,  and  Hedge,  Miiller,  Parker,  ^00. 
Christianity  contrasted  with  the  religions 
it  displaced,  51-53.  Its  connection  with 
the  preceding  Judaism,  53,  54.  The 
Fatherhood  of  God,  57,  58  ;  notes  on  the 
name  "Father,"  MuUer,  Luther,  Cou- 
langes,  Whitney,  Heam,  404,  405.  See 
God. 

Lecture  III. — The  new  conception  oJ 
Man  i7itroduced  by  Christianity,  67-99, 
notes,  409-433. 

The  teachings  of  Christianity  to  man 
concerning  himself,  69.  Its  recognition 
of  mankind  without  distinction,  77-79. 
Its  message  of  Divine  recognition  and  the 
correspondences  and  contrasts,  in  this  re- 
spect, of  other  religions,  80-83  ;  notes, 
Maurice,  MuUer,  the  A  vesta,  Plato,  Grote, 
Curtius,  Duncker,  Kant,  Schaff,  414-416. 
Offered  for  the  voluntary  acceptance  of 
each  human  person,  85,  &5  ;  notes,  Chan- 
ning, Seneca,  417.  Its  app>eal,  through 
preaching,  to  the  conscience  and  to  the 
intellect  of  man,  86-89;  notes,  Newman, 
418,  Parker,  420.  Its  recognition  of  man's 
capacity  for  affection,  89,  90  ;  note,  Kant, 
420,  421.  Its  recognition  of  a  future  life 
for  man,  90,  91,  93,  94 ;  notes,  Stanley, 
Taylor,  429.  See  Future  life.  The 
Evangelical  doctrines,  94.  Attitude  of 
Christianity  toward  sin,  95,  96  ;  notes, 
Martineau,  Carlyle,  430.  Effect  of  the 
new  conception  of  Man  on  the  race,  96-99  ; 
notes,  Pascal,  Villemain,  430.  Its  sub- 
lime conception  of  immortality,  99.  See 
Man. 

Lecture  IV. — The  new  conception  0/ 
the  duty  of  man  toward  God,  in  worship, 
103-132,  fiotes,  434-458. 

The  duty  of  man  to  offer  a  true  wor- 
ship, 103.  Primitive  religious  customs  of 
the  disciples  of  Christianity,  104,  105 ; 
notes,  Pliny,  Celsus,  Justin  Martyr,  434. 
Its  liberation  from  the  ancestral  ritual  of 
sacrifice,  105.  Its  doctrine  of  sacrifice, 
109-114 ;  notes,  Taylor,  Canons  of  tha 
Council  of  Trent,  Bunsen,  Jameson, 
Parknian,  442-444.    See  Sacrifice.    Iti 


646 


INDEX. 


master-word  always  Love ;  toward  God, 
toward  man,  115.  Christianity  and  music, 
117,  118 ;  notes,  Socrates  :  EccL  Hist., 
Montalembert,  Hawkins,  Bingham, 
Augustine,  Clement,  Cyprian,  Tertullian, 
Eusebius,  445-447.  Channing,  Newman 
and  Milton  on  the  spiritual  efficacy  of 
music,  448,  449.  Its  Hymnody,  118,  119 ; 
notes,  Parker,  Bingham,  Liddon,  Cole- 
man, Daniel,  Bunsen,  Dexter's  version  of 
the  Hymn  of  Clement,  Eusebius,  Trench, 
449-451.  Its  Creeds,  119-121  ;  notes, 
Schaff  and  Luther  on  the  Apostles'  Creed, 
451.  Its  Liturgies,  121, 122  ;  notes,  Ham- 
mond, Bede,  Palmer,  Neale,  452,  453. 
Its  daily  worship,  and  services  of  solemn 
festival,  122,  Palmer  on  the  "  Hours  "  of 
prayer  quoted,  and  description  of  a 
"  Book  of  Hours,"  453,  Its  disciples  and 
the  Hebrew  temple,  124.  Its  houses  ol 
worship,  125,  126  ;  Renan  and  Michelet 
quoted,  455.  The  purpose  and  office  of 
Christian  worship,  126,  127.  Christianity 
and  the  practical  service  of  life,  129-132  ; 
notes,  Athenagoras,  Celsus,  Tatian,  Con- 
stantine.  Trench,  457,  458.  See  Wor- 
ship. 

Lecture  V. — The  new  conception  of 
man^s  duty  to  man,  in  politics  and  so- 
ciety, 135-169,  notes,  459-497. 

Childhood  under  Christianity,  i44-i<i6  ; 
notes,  464,  465.  See  Childhood.  Wo- 
man under  Christianity,  151-154 ;  notes, 
Tacitus,  Martial,  Tertullian,  Augustine, 
DoUinger,  Ozanam,  Martineau,  475-477. 
See  Woman.  Slavery  under  Christianity, 
160-163  ;  notes,  488-493.  See  Slavery. 
The  poor  and  dependent  before  Christi- 
anity, and  after  its  appearance,  164-168  ; 
notes,  Plautus,  Plato,  Apostolic  Constitu- 
tions, Spencer,  de  Stael,  Nice.  Ethics, 
Kant,  Norton,  Voltaire,  Montalembert, 
Lecky,  493-496.  Its  effect  on  the  prog- 
ress of  society,  168,  169,  Coleridge 
quoted,  497. 

Lecture  VI. — The  new  conception  of 
the  duties  of  Nations,  toward  each  other, 
173-208,  7iotes,  498-526. 

The  benefits  of  Christianity  spiritual 
in  its  first  design,  and,  in  a  secondary 
way,  secular,  173.  Impulse  given  by  it 
to  International  Law,  179;  notes,  Savigny, 
Ward,  501.  Councils,  181,  182,  Voltaire 
quoted,  503.  Influence  of  Bernard  of 
Clairvaux,  183,  184 ;  notes,  Neander,  Cal- 
vin, 505,  506.  Formation  and  progress 
of  International  Law  under  Christianity, 
184-194 ;  notes,  506-512.  See  Inter- 
national Law.  Treaties,  194,  195 ; 
note  on  the  treaty  of  St.  Petersburgh, 
512.  See  Treaties.  Ambassadors,  196. 
See  Ambassadors.  Treatment  of  stran- 
gers, exiles,  and  fugitives  from  slavery 
under  Christianity,  197,  x<^%\7iotes,  Fcelix, 
Savigny,  Woolsey,  516,  517.  See  Stran- 
gers, etc.  Its  effect  on  commerce ;  199  ; 
note  on  the  ancient  isolation  of  states, 


518.  Its  force  on  civilization,  199,  200, 
Its  amelioration  of  the  laws  and  usages  oj 
war,  200-206 ;  jiotes,  518-523.  See  War. 
Its  introduction  of  humanity  and  justice 
into  the  maxims  of  the  world,  206-208  ; 
notes,  525,  526. 

Lecture  VI L— The  effect  of  Christ i* 
anity  on  the  mental  culture  of  mankind^ 
211-245,  notes,  527-566. 

Mental  culture  before  Christianity,  and 
of  illustrious  men  in  Christendom  who 
have  not  admitted  a  personal  indebtedness 
to  its  religion,  211-216 ;  notes,  Origen, 
Macaulay,  Plutarch ;  notes  on  the  first 
epistle  of  Peter,  and  the  Gospel  of  St. 
John,  527,  528.  Christianity  a  lettered 
Faith,  217.  Its  Scriptures  addressed  to 
the  faith,  and  adapted  to  the  intellectual 
capacity  of  all  classes,  219-223 ;  notes, 
Augustine,  Origen,  Huxley,  Parker,  535- 
537.  See  Bible.  Its  power  to  develop 
and  train  a  self-respecting  middle-class, 
223,  224 ;  notes.  Mill,  Pressense,  538.  Its 
effect  upon  the  higher  human  spirit  and 
intelligence,  225-227 ;  votes,  Newman, 
Jones,  Pascal,  Rousseau,  Coleridge,  Mar- 
tineau, Baur,  Arnold,  Goethe,  Stanley, 
Ewald,  Newman,  539^543.  Effect  of  the 
supernatural  element  in  Christianity,  227, 
228.  Its  significant  silences  upon  themes 
of  deep  human  interest,  228-230  ;  note  on 
La  Place,  544.  The  philosophy,  specula- 
tive criticism,  the  variety  and  practical 
fruitfulness  of  the  literary  work  prompted 
by  it,  231,  232  ;  notes,  Justin  Martyr,  Cle- 
ment, Gregory  Thaumat.,  Basil,  Augus- 
tine, Tertullian,  Troplong,  Giessler,  Lac- 
tantius,  Theodoret,  Ammianus,  Newman^ 
Humphreys,  544-550.  Christianity  and 
Art,  232-235;  notes,  Rossi,  Liibke,  Tyr- 
whitt,  Pressense,  Hodgkin,  550-552.  The 
true  Renaissance,  233,  234  ;  notes,  Burck- 
hardt,  Bryce,  Lessing,  Ruskin,  553,  554. 
Impulses  by  Christianity  in  every  field  of 
intellectual  activity,  235,  236  ;  notes,  Schil- 
ler. Humboldt,  Coleridge,  Pierce  ;  note  on 
Shakespeare  and  notes  on  Edwards,  554- 
556.  Its  preachers  and  expositors,  236, 
237  ;  notes,  Gibbon,  Mackenzie,  Apostolic 
Constitutions,  Bede,  Merivale,  556,  557. 
Its  historians,  237,  238 ;  notes,  Pascal, 
Gibbon,  558.  Linguistic  studies  prompted 
by  it,  239,  240  ;  jtotes,  Bede,  Guizot,  Hist. 
Lit,  de  la  France,  Ozanam,  558,  559. 
Popular  education  under  it,  and  the  con- 
trast of  other  rehgions,  240-245  ;  notes, 
560-565.  The  superlative  educational 
force  of  the  world  embodied  in  it,  245  ; 
notes,  Channing,  Martineau,  566. 

Lecture  VIII.— The  effect  of  Christi- 
anity on  the  moral  life  of  mankind,  249- 
282,  7iotes,  567-597. 

Moral  fife  of  antiquity  at  the  time  Chris- 
tianity appeared,  249-263 ;  notes,  567- 
582.  The  Jews  at  the  same  period  and 
the  pagan  hoslifity  to  both  Jew  and  Chris- 
tian,   264,    265 ;    notes,    582-585.     Th« 


INDEX. 


647 


moral  system  of  Christianity,  pureness  in 
the  heart,  266,  267  ;  Taylor  quoted,  585. 
Pagan  references  to  it,  267  ;  notes,  Taci- 
tus, Suetonius,  Pliny,  Epictetus,  Marcus 
Aurelius,  586.  Character  the  essential 
thing  in  it,  267.  The  personal  Head  of 
the  religion,  267,  268 ;  Taylor  quoted,  586. 
Its  disciples,  265,  270 ;  Minucius  Felix 
quoted,  586.  Its  virtues — "the  fruits  of 
the  spirit,"  271,  272 ;  notes,  Northcote, 
Symonds,  Tertullian,  587,  588.  Its  law 
of  benevolence  and  the  contrast  of  other 
religions,  272-274 ;  notes,  Tacitus,  Sene- 
ca, Cyprian,  Justin  Martyr,  Apost.  Con- 
stitutions, Ozanam,  Eusebius,  Gibbon, 
Mores  Catholici,  Northcote,  588-591. 
Persecutions  of  its  believers,  274-277; 
notes,  592-595.  See  Martyrs.  The 
splendor  of  the  triumph  of  Christianity, 
277-279 ;  Justin  Martyr  quoted,  596.  Its 
influence  on  the  moral  life  of  the  world, 
279-282 ;  notes,  Lecky,  Mill,  Parker,  596, 
597. 

Lecture  IX. — The  effect  of  Christian- 
ity on  the  world'' s  hope  0/  progress,  285- 
316;  notes,  598-624. 

A  distinct  apprehension  of  the  Christian 
doctrine  of  God  indispensable  to  any  con- 
viction of  a  developed  unity  in  history, 
285,  286,  Absence  from  the  religions  of  an- 
tiquity of  such  a  recognition  of  God,  and 
of  any  hope  of  progress,  286-296  ;  notes, 
598-606.  The  Jews  and  the  hope  of 
progress,  296-300  ;  notes,  Renan,  Strauss, 
607.  Under  Christianity,  300-306  ;  notes, 
608-616.  This  hope  the  foundation  of 
missionary  enterprise,  306-308 ;  notes, 
617-619.  Its  transient  failure  at  the  close 
of  the  tenth  century,  309-11  ;  Michelet 
quoted,  620.  Since  the  era  of  the  Refor- 
mation, 311-313;  notes,  Bancroft,  Brad- 
ford, 621.  The  hope  for  the  future,  under 
Christianity,  313-316 ;  notes,  Savigny, 
Lecky,  Parker,  Liddon,  Arnold,  Neale, 
621-624. 

Lecture  X. — A  review  of  the  argument, 
ivith  added  suggestions,  319-357  ;  notes, 
625-639. 

Review,  319-328.  The  individual  vic- 
tories of  Christianity,  328,  329 ;  notes, 
Neander,  Jameson,  625.  Its  comfort  to 
the  afflicted,  329,  Its  Divine  origin  indi- 
cated, 330,  331 ;  Godet  quoted,  625.  Max- 
ims common  to  it,  and  to  other  religions, 
331,  332  ;  notes,  626,  627.  Wherein  dis- 
similar to  the  religions  which  pi-eceded  or 
surrounded  it,  332-336-,  notesy  Barth, 
Jones,  Augustine,  628,  629.  Self-de- 
veloped, 336-342  ;  notes,  Liddon,  Chan- 
ning,  Renan,  Domer,  630,  631  ;  the  in- 
fidel view,  Reade,  Wise,  632.  The  evi- 
dent Divine  plan  for  its  rapid  extension, 
343-348  ;  Jtotes,  632-635.  Its  silent,  ener- 
getic and  persistent  progress,  348.  Its 
diveise  development  and  self -resurrection, 
349 ;  Baur  quoted,  636.  The  command- 
ing factor  in  whatever  is  best  in  persons 


and  states  at  the  present  time,  350 ;  Mul* 
ler  quoted,  636.  The  argument  from 
miracles  slill  energetic,  350,  351  ;  notes, 
Channing,  Taylor,  637.  Christianity  not 
local  but  universal,  351,  352;  notes,  Maine, 
Parker,  Martineau,  638.  Conclusion, 
352-357  ;  notes,  639. 

Christlieb,  his  "Modem  Doubt  and 
Christian  Belief  "  quoted,  432. 

Chrcnos,  statue  of,  at  Carthage;  sacri- 
fice of  children  there,  108,  440. 

Chrysippus,  568. 

Chrysostom,  St.,  on  singling,  117.  On 
property  in  .slaves,  157 ;  quoted,  481. 
Bond  and  free,  with  him,  on  the  same 
footing,  162 ;  quoted,  491.  Hospitals 
established  by  him,  59i-  References  to, 
98,  153,  231,  236,  446,  452,  556. 

Chubb,  566. 

Chuza,  wife  of,  151. 

Cicero,  his  philosophy,  41,  55,  86.  On 
the  gods,  38,  43 ;  quoted,  381,  393,  394, 
The  future  life,  91 ;  quoted,  422,  423.  On 
children,  139  ;  quoted,  459, 460.  On  wom- 
en, 150  ;  quoted,  471.  Prisoners  enslaved, 
156 ;  quoted,  480.  Slave  killed  for  using 
a  hunting  spear,  159 ;  quoted,  487.  Duty 
of  man  to  man,  i66.     Ideal  of  character, 

252.  On  sin,  and  the  beauty  of  humanity, 

253.  The  arena,  260.  On  the  oracle  at 
Delphi,  292 ;  quoted,  602.  On  portents, 
294.  Astrology,  295.  On  predictions, 
372.  Usefulness  of  piety  to  the  state,  454. 
On  Plato,  467.  On  the  death  of  a  slave, 
478.  On  war,  503.  Enemy  and  stranger 
515.  Disdain  of  humble  industry,  538 
On  the  Greek  writings,  632,  633.  Lac 
tantius  on  Cicero,  547,  568.  Jerome,  568 
Incidental  references,  98,  iii,  160,  180, 
296,  331,  431,  473,  557i  560. 

CiLiciAN  slave  trade,  479. 

CiNESiAS,  572. 

Claudia,  152 ;  Martial  quoted,  475. 

Claudius  deified,  43  ;  Seneca  quoted,  395. 
Suetonius  quoted,  459,  488.  Tacitus,  579 
603.     References  to,  138,  159,  259. 

Cleanthes,  252. 

Clement  of  Alexandria.  On  music  and 
fellowship,  447.  Clement's  hymn,  119 ; 
Dexter's  version  quoted,  450.  On  the 
study  of  Greek  literature,  231 ;  quoted, 
545.  Against  seeking  persecution,  596. 
On  the  study  of  philosophy,  303  ;  quoted, 
610.  Quotes  Euripides,  431.  Referen- 
ces, 98,  528. 

Clement  of  Rome,  528. 

Clifford  quoted,  408,  426. 

Clodius,  Seneca  on,  573. 

Coke,  514. 

Coleman  :  "  Andent  Christianity"  quoted, 
450. 

Coleridge  on  Christianity,  28,  367,  378. 


648 


INDEX. 


555.  On  pagan  philosophy,  9c,  On  Plato, 
105.  On  religion,  362.  On  miracles,  371. 
On  Christian  society,  497.  On  the  Bible, 
540. 

Collins,  556,  566. 

Colosseum,  258,  259;  its  construction, 
Merivale  quoted,  577  ;  reference  to,  328  ; 
gladiatorial  and  other  games  at,  576. 

COLUMBA,  308 ;  notes^  Bede,  Montalembert, 
Smith,  619. 

Columella  :  his  treatment  of  slaves,  Oza- 
nam  quoted,  485. 

Commerce  and  Christianity,  179, 199.  An- 
cient isolation  of  states,  Plato  quoted,  518. 
During  war-time,  203 ;  Woolsey  quoted, 
520.  The  Hanseatic  league,  184.  The 
Elsineur  exactions  by  Denmark,  Marcy 
quoted,  512. 

COMMODIANUS  on  martyrdom,  596. 

Commodus,  576. 

Commonwealth,  Plato's  ideal,  85 ;  his 
"  Laws"  quoted,  416,  417. 

COMTE,  538. 

Concubinage,  151 ;  notes,  473-475. 

Conditions  of  the  acceptance  of  religious 
truth,  18,  19;  notes,  Martineau,  Pascal, 
369. 

Confessions  of  Faith,  119.    See  Creeds. 

Confucius.    See  China. 

Conscience,  and  the  truth  of  Christian- 
ity, 19;  Martineau's  Miscellanies  quoted, 
369.  The  appeal  to,  by  preaching,  86. 
The  Christian  conception  of,  265.  The 
Daimon,  within,  of  the  Platonic  Socrates, 
58 ;  notes,  Plato,  DoUinger,  405, 406.  The 
Latin  "  conscientia,"  252. 

Consciousness  and  speculation,  68.  Chris- 
tian consciousness,  350  ;  MuUer  quoted, 
636,  637. 

Consecration  and  obedience,  130. 

CONSTANTINE  and  Christian  worship,  131 ; 
his  "Orat.  to  Assembly"  quoted,  458. 
Slavery  under,  162 ;  Martineau  quoted, 
492.  His  amphitheatrical  exhibitions, 
260.     References  to,  325,  464,  591. 

CONYBEARE  and  Howson,  quoted  on  Ga- 
maliel, 639. 

Copenhagen,  its  origin,  Montalembert 
quoted,  496. 

Cornelia,  602. 

correggio,  144. 

COULANGES  on  the  meaning  of  "  Father," 
57,  405.  His  "Ancient  City"  quoted, 
394.  405,  459. 

COUNCILS  of  State,  182 ;  Voltaire  quoted, 
503. 

Council  of  Aries,  557.  Of  Chalons, 
561.  Of  Orange,  162.  Of  Orleans,  561.  Of 
Rheims,  162.  Of  Paris,  561.  Of  Vaison, 
561.    Of  Tours,  253.    Of  Trent,  Seneca 


quoted  at,  as  one  of  the  Fath(  rs,  2  53 ;  jxt 
infant  communion,  the  canon  quoted, 
466 ;  on  the  propitiatory  sacrifice  of  Christ, 
the  canon  quoted,  442,  443 

Couture,  255. 

Crassus,  157,  298,  480. 

Creasy,  his  "Ottoman  Turks"  quoted, 
500,  514. 

Credibility  of  evidence  in  religious  mat- 
ters, 28-32 ;  notes,  378-380. 

Creeds,  119-121 ;  7totes,  Schaff,  Luther 
451.  The  Turanian  creed,  Taylor  quoted, 
427. 

Crcesus,  610. 

Croyland  Abbey  and  the  University  of 

Cambridge,    242 ;    Ingulphus'   Chronicle 

quoted,  562,  563. 

Cudworth  on  early  monotheism,  his  "  In* 

tellectual  System  "  quoted,  390,  391. 
Culture  and  Christianity,  211-213  ;  notes^ 

527. 
Curtius:    "History  of  Greece"  quoted, 

415,  502. 
CuTHBERT,  account  of  the  death  of  Bede 

"  Epist.  de  obit.  Bedse  "  quoted,  620 ;  ref* 

erence  to,  308. 
Cyprian,  303,  447,  465,  589,  595,  629. 
Cyrus,  498,  542. 
CZOLBE,  432. 

Dana,  510. 

Daniel,  "  Thesaurus  Hymnologicus  "  quo 

ted,  450. 
Dante,  131,  154,  223,  228,  260,  536. 
Daphnides,  482. 
Darius,  500. 

David,  the  psalmist,  221,  232,  296. 
Davids,  "Indian  Buddhism"  quoted,  107, 

398,  419,  428. 
Davidson,  528. 
Deborah,  147. 
Decius,  304,  612. 
Dega,  308. 
Deification  of  men  and  virtues,  42,  43 ; 

notes,  393-395. 
Delphi,  oracle  at,  39,  288,  292,  406,  439. 

Explanation  by  Cicero  of  its  loss  of  re« 

pute,  292  ;  quoted,  602.     See  ORACLES. 
Demangeat,  517. 
Democritus  on  ^Man  :  quoted  by  Plutarch, 

568. 
Demosthenes,  157, 164,  232, 481,  ^98,  557 

quoted,  468. 
Desiderius,  549. 
Destruction  of  the  world,  309 ;  Michelel 

quoted,  620.     Theories  of  the  Stoics,  301 

Dollinger  and  Seneca  quoted,  609. 


INDEX. 


649 


'Oeutsch,  the  Talmud  quoted  by  him  on 
woman,  467 ;  and  on  luxury  in  Rome, 
569. 

-De  Wette  on  prophecy,  23,  His  •'  In- 
troduction to  the  Old  Testament "  qiioted 
on  the  prophets,  373. 

Dexter  :  two  stanzas  of  his  metrical 
version  of  Clement's  hymn  quoted,  450. 

Diadem  of  the  Christian  religion,  329. 

Diaspora,  346,  347. 

DiGBY :  "Mores  Catholici"  quoted,  591. 

Dik6,  293. 

Dio  Cassius,  292,  294,  296,  440,  460,  591. 

^Diocletian,  304,  606. 

Diogenes,  156,  560. 

DiOGNETUS,  303 ;  epistle  to,  v.  vi.  quoted, 
611. 

Dion,  558. 

DiONYSIA,  576. 

Dionysius,  156,  459,  479,  567,  577. 
Dispersion  of  the  Jews,  346,  347 ;  notesy 

Lightfoot,  Augustine,  Josephus,  635. 
Divine  origin  of  Christianity;   nature  of 

the  evidence  required  to  indicate  it,  28-32  ; 

notes,  Coleridge,  Ewald,  Baur,  Savigny, 

Rowe,  Lecky,  378-380. 
Dogma  and  Logic,  15  ;   Newman  quoted, 

368. 
Dollinger:  his  "Gentile  and  the  Jew" 

quoted,  390,  392,  398,  406,  418,  436,  440, 

441,   455,    515,    586,   598,  600,   604,  6og. 

"  First  Age  of  the  Church,"  476. 
Dominic,  offers  himself  in  exchange  for  a 

slave,  113  ;  Jameson  quoted,  443. 
•DOMITIAN,  258,  259,  274,  476,  576,  591. 
Domitilla,  Cemetery  of,  232,  550. 
DOMiTius,  159 ;  Cicero  quoted,  487. 
Dorner,  his  "Person  of  Christ "  quoted, 

MO,  631. 
Oorotheus'  Italian  History,  reference  to, 

442. 
■^OUGLAS,  his  "Confucianism  and  Taou- 

ism  "  quoted,  149,  364,  436. 
Jroit    d'Aubaine,    Voltaire,    ^nd    Brace 

quoted,  5x5,  516. 
Dubois,  525. 
Duncker,    his    "History    of    Antiquity" 

quoted,  41,  389,  398,  409,  412,  415,  416, 

532. 

Ebbo,  306. 
Ebrard,  331,  626. 

Eckermann's  "  Conversations  with 
Goethe  "  quoted,  371. 

Education,  popular,  under  Christianity, 
and  the  contrast  of  other  religions,  240- 
245 ;  notes,  Zeller,  Plutarch,  Brace,  Gui- 
lot,  Remusat,  Ingulphus,  Hallam,  Meri- 


vale,  MuUer,  Whitney,  560-565  Edu« 
cation  of  women  in  the  fifth  century, 
Ozanam  quoted,  477.  Education  oj 
Christians  forbidden,  Ammianus  quoted, 
549.  The  value  of  the  Bible  for  popular 
education  and  mental  culture,  222-224  ; 
notes,  Origen,  Huxley,  Parker,  536,  537. 
Christianity  the  sovereign  educational 
force  of  the  world,  245  ;  tiotes,  Channing, 
Martineau,  566. 

Edward  VI.,  motto  used  by  him,  277. 

Edwards,  236;  notes,  Mackintosh,  Hall, 
Stewart,  556, 

Effect  of  Christianity  on  the  mental  cul- 
ture of  mankind.  Lecture  VII.,  211-245  ; 
notes,  527-566.  On  the  moral  life  of 
mankind,  Lecture  VIIL,  249-2S2  ;  notes, 
567-597.  On  the  world's  hope  of  progress, 
Lecture  IX.,  285-316  ;  notes,  598-624. 

Egbert  of  York,  557. 

Egeria,  her  instruction  of  Numa,  60 ; 
Niebuhr  quoted,  365. 

Egypt  :  the  gods  of,  pleased  with  lamenta- 
tions, 38  ;  Apuleius  quoted,  382.  Strabo 
on  the  doctrine  of  God  by  Moses,  41,  389. 
Polytheism  in  Egypt,  42  ;  Renouf  quoted, 
390.  The  worship  of  monsters,  47  ;  Juve- 
nal quoted,  399.  Its. doctrine  of  future 
existence,  92 ;  Renouf  quoted,  428.  Its 
Book  0/  the  Dead,  Renouf  quoted,  531. 
No  middle  class  in,  224.  Its  doctrine  01 
metempsychosis,  290 ;  Herodotus  quoted, 
599,  6co.     Its  monuments,  290. 

Elegabalus  worshipped,  44;  Gibbon 
quoted,  396.     Reference  to,  592. 

Eleusinian  mysteries,  42  ;  notes,  Dollin- 
ger, 392,  585.     Uhlhom,  392. 

Elizabeth  of  England,  aids  the  revolted 
Hollanders,  512. 

Elizabeth  of  Russia,  256. 

Elizabeth,  Saint,  631. 

Emmelia,  153. 

Empedocles,  his  metempsychosis,  Dollin- 
ger quoted,  600. 

End  of  the  world,  expected  in  the  Middle 
Age,  309  ;  Michelet  quoted,  620. 

Ennius,  424,  633. 

Enthusiasts,  Lessing  quoted,  526.  Fa- 
naticism and  enthusiasm,  i6. 

Ephrem,  his  last  words,  490. 
Epictetus,  his  idea  of  God,  44,  396.     No 

success  in  teaching,   396.     His    idea  of 

man's  relationship  to  God,  and  the  future 

life,  91,  425.     His  reference  to  Christians, 

586. 
Epicureans,  40;    Lucretius  quoted,  387. 

No  thought  by  them  of  the  poor,  591. 

Cicero  in  regard    to  the  sentiments  oi 

Epicurus,  393. 
Epiphanes,  298. 
Erasmus,  237,  311. 


650 


INDEX. 


Erixo,  461. 

Erwin  of  Steinbach,  153. 

EscULAPius,  island  of,  488. 

Eternity  of  God,  49,  50.  A  distinct  ap- 
prehension of  His  unity  and  eternity  in- 
dispensable to  any  conviction  of  a  devel- 
oped unity  in  history,  285. 

Eternity  of  God  and  astronomy,  50 ; 
Hartwig-  quoted,  401.  Sceptical  views  of 
immortality  and  eternity,  Schleiermacher 
and  Strauss  quoted,  433. 

Ethics,  Christian,  spiritualized  by  faith, 
130 ;  effect  of,  on  the  heathen  in  early 
times,  274.  Stoical  ethics,  142.  Ethics 
and  philosophy,  254;  Plutarch  quoted, 
568. 

Ethnic  religions,  their  historical  and 
solemn  interest,  36,  37.  Contrasted  with 
Christianity,  51,  52.  The  noblest  ethnic 
precursor  of  the  Master,  the  Platonic 
Socrates,  58  ;  Plato  quoted  and  fiote  on 
Plato  by  Dollinger,  405,  406.  Ethnic  re- 
ligions in  their  best  aspect,  80 ;  notes^ 
Maurice,  the  Rig- Veda,  the  Avesta,  Plato, 
Grote,  Curtius,  414,  415.  Mostly  with- 
out instruction  or  preaching,  86 ;  notes, 
Renan,  Dollinger,  418.  Parallels  in  them 
to  Christian  precepts,  85,  87  ;  notes,  Ta- 
tian,  374;  Thorliton,  Confucius,  Davids, 
Hardy,  Aristotle,  Plato,  419,  420.  Their 
references  to  a  future  life  for  man,  91,  92  ; 
ttoteSy  421-428.  Their  attitude  toward 
sin,  95.  Sacrificial  offerings,  ic8  ;  notes, 
438-442.  Their  numerous  local  gods  and 
localized  worship,  123 ;  notes,  Tiele, 
Cicero,  Dollinger,  454,  455.  Childhood 
under  ethnic  religions,  138 -141 ;  ttotes, 
459-463.  Woman,  148-15 1 ;  notes,  467- 
475.  Slavery,  154-160 ;  notes,  478-487. 
The  poor  and  dependent,  164 ;  notes, 
Plautus,  Plato,  493,  494.  War,  174,  175  ; 
notes,  498,  499.  Treatment  of  heralds 
and  ambassadors,  176, 177  ;  notes,  Herod- 
otus, Pausanius,  Thucydides,  500.  Un- 
friendly to  international  law,  186 ;  the 
Koran  quoted,  508.  Strangers  regarded  as 
enemies,  197  ;  notes,  515,  516.  Isolation 
of  ancient  states,  199 ;  Plato  quoted,  518. 
Genius  and  mental  activity  of  the  Greeks, 
214 ;  Plutarch  quoted,  527.  See  Sacred 
Books.  No  middle-class  in  their  com- 
munities, 224 ;  Moramsen  quoted,  537. 
Popular  education,  240,  241 ;  notes,  Zel- 
ler,  Plutarch,  560,  561,  The  effect  on 
mental  culture  of  the  ethnic  religions, 
and  the  contrast  of  Christianity,  241-245  ; 
notes,  561-566.  Moral  life  under  the 
ethnic  religions  at  the  time  Christianity 
appeared,  249-263  ;  notes,  569-582.  Ab- 
sence from  them  of  faith,  267.  Pagan 
references  to  Christianity,  267 ;  notes, 
Tacitus,  Suetonius,  Pliny,  Epictetus, 
Marcus  Aurelius,  586.  Buddhism  nearest 
of  all  to  Christianity,  281,  282.  Ethnic 
religions  without  hope  of  human  progress, 
286-296  ;  notes,  598-606.     Maxims  com- 


mon to  them  and  to  Christianity,  33  r 
332  ;  notes,  626,  627.  Added  suggestion! 
of  comparison  with  Christianity,  332-336; 
notes,  Bartb,  Jones,  Augustine,  628,  62^ 

Eucharist,  administered  to  children,  145  • 
notes.  Apostolic  Constitutions,  Cyprian. 
Stanley,  465,  466  ;  forbidden  by  the  Coun- 
cil of  Trent,  466.  Eucharistic  idea  of 
sacrifice,  107 ;  in  the  Roman  Catholic 
church,  log,  no  ;  Canon  of  the  Council 
of  Trent  quoted,  442,  443. 

EUGENIUS  HI.,  Pope  ;  and  Bernard,  506. 

EUMENIDES,  the,  288. 

Eunice,  152. 

Euripides,  288,  410,  425,  431,  473,  527, 
598  ;  on  domestic  life,  27T,  587. 

EUSEBIUS,  273,  276,  303,  44S,  451,  458,  528, 
535,  590,  593,  594,  595,  614. 

EUSTOCHIA,  477. 

Evangelical  doctrines  of  Christianity,  11, 
94. 

Evening  hymn  cited  by  Basil,  119  ;  trans- 
lation of,  450. 

Evidence  required  to  indicate  the  Divine 
origin  of  Christianity,  28-32  ;  notes,  Col- 
eridge, Ewald,  Baur,  Savigny,  Rowe, 
Lecky,  378-380. 

Evil  and  Good,  the  struggle  between ; 
sceptical  view  of.  Mill  quoted,  399. 

Evil  wrought  by  some  of  the  adherents  of 
Christianity,  15-17,  26;  Symonds  quoted, 
369. 

Evolution,  theory  of,  50 ;  its  futiHty  when 
applied  to  Man,  341. 

EVROULT,  St.,  617. 

Ewald,  his  "  Geschichte  des  Volkes  Israel " 
quoted  ;  on  religion,  28,  379 ;  on  sacrifice, 
438  ;  the  prophetic  gift,  542. 

Exiles.    See  Strangers,  etc. 

Expiatory  idea,  the,  107 ;  Dollinger  quo- 
ted, 436.  The  Hebrew  peace-offering, 
107.    See  Sacrifice. 

External  evidence  for  Christianity  as  Di- 
vine ;  the  value  and  limitations  of  its  pro- 
bative force.  Lecture  I.,  3-32  ;  wo/^j,  361- 
380. 

Fabian,  his  death,  612. 

Fabtola,  hospitals  founded  by  her,  Ozanam 

quoted,  589;  "Mores  Catholici,"  591. 
Fabius,  enslaves  captives,  156,  480. 
FAtRY  tales  and  miracles,  comparison  of,. 

by  Lecky,  30,  380. 

Faith  in  Christianity,  experience  of  its 
power  the  only  final  evidence,  13,  14  ; 
notes,  Coleridge,  ,  Chanuing,  Maurice, 
367,  368.  See  Miracles,  Prophecies.. 
Argumentative  proof  and  faith,  15  ;  New- 
man quoted,  368.  To  be  judged  by  its 
effects  on  peoples  rather  than  on  individ- 
uzds,  28,  29;  noieSy   Miiller,   Martineau,, 


INDEX. 


65i 


Maurice,  Coleridge,  Ewald,  Baur,  378, 
379.  Ethics  spiritualized  by  it,  130. 
Some  of  its  effects,  268,  300,  330,  355. 
Minucius  Felix  quoted,  586.  Martineau 
quoted  on  faith  in  God,  408 ;  the  effects 
of,  on  domestic  li'e  and  affection,  477  ; 
and  on  unity  of  faith,  638.  For  scepti- 
cal views,  see  Infidelity. 

Faith  in  heathen  gods,  decay  of,  40  ;  Sen- 
eca quoted,  586  ;  Plato,  388.  Ridicule  of 
them,  42 ;  ?iotes,  Horace,  Livy,  Aristo- 
phanes, 391,  392.    See  Worship. 

Fanaticism  and  enthusiasm,  16.  Lessing 
on  enthusiasts,  526. 

Fannia,  263 ;  notice  of  her,  by  Pliny,  472. 

Farrar,  a.  S.,  his  "Critical  History  of 
Free  Thought "  quoted,  70,  535. 

Farrar,  F.  W.,  his  "Witness  of  History 
to  Christ "  quoted,  279,   351. 

Fate,  Greek  conception  of,  288 ;  notes  on 
Nemesis  ;  DoUinger,  Symonds,  598  ;  Sen- 
eca quoted,  387.  Modem  approach  to  the 
Greek  conception,  Goethe  quoted,  288, 
289 ;  tiotesy  599.  Stoical  necessity,  85, 
302  ;  Seneca  quoted,  417 ;  DoUinger,  Sen- 
eca, Marcus  Aurelius,  Polybius,  609,  610. 

Father,  Heavenly,  different  conceptions 
of  the  name,  57  ;  notes^  Muller,  Luther, 
Coulanges,  Whitney,  Heam,  404,  405. 

Fatherhood  of  God,  shown  by  Christian- 
ity, 57.  58. 

Fathers,  the  early;  study  of  the  Greek 
literature  advocated  by  them,  231,  232  ; 
notes,  Justin  Martyr,  Clement,  Origen, 
Gregory  Thaumat,,  Basil,  Augustine, 
Tertullian,  544-547.  See  St.  Paul,  under 
Gospels. 

Fear  of  the  Lord,  the  predominant  senti- 
ment in  Hebrew  worship,  52,  53. 

Felicitas,  276 ;  "  Passion  of  Perpetua  and 
Felicitas  "  quoted,  594,  612. 

Felton,  Lectures  on  Greece  quoted,  479. 

Fenelon  referred  to  by  Renan,  631. 

Ferdinand  the  Catholic,  514. 

Feuerbach,  432. 

Fiacre,  the  Irish  monk,  patron  saint  of 
gardeners,  618. 

Ficino,  Marsiglio,  58. 

FiNNIAN,  308. 

Fisher,  his  "  Beginnings  of  Christianity  " 
referred  to,  74. 

J'lassan,  513. 

Flavia  Domitilla,  banished  by  Domitian 
for  atheism,  274;  "Roma  Sotterranea  " 
quoted,  592. 

FLAVIANS,  576. 

Flavius  Clemens,  274,  591. 
Fleury,  his  "  Saint  Paul  et  Seneque  "  re- 
ferred to,  547. 
Flora,  temples  of,  described  by  Ovid,  384. 


Florence.    Memorial  of  Dominic  in  th4 

convent  of  San  Marco,  443. 
Florus  referred  to,  183. 
FCELIX,   his    "Droit   International   Prive " 

quoted,  517. 

FORAMINIFERA,  description  of,  by  Hart« 
wig,  404. 

FoRE-GLEAMS  of  the  transcendent  light, 
55 ;  notes,  Plato,  Socrates,  Sophocles, 
iEschylus,  402,  403.    See  Maxims. 

Fourth  Gospel.    See  Gospels. 

France  :  the  formation  of  the  nation,  Sis- 
mondi  quoted,  503.  God's  Truce  in, 
Guizot  quoted,  506.  The  richest  districts 
in  France  to-day  those  wherein  the  ancient 
monasteries  were  planted,  308  ;  Monta- 
lembert  quoted,  618.  Francis  I.,  his  con- 
tempt for  public  promises,  513.  Remon- 
strance by  France  against  the  partition  of 
Poland,  512.  Mme.  de  Stael  on  religion 
and  liberty  there,  494.  Naval  instructions 
in  1854,  in  regard  to  non-combatants, 
203,  520.  The  Paris  Declaration,  of  1856, 
on  privateering,  520. 

Francis  of  Assisi,  113,  631. 

Francis  I.  violates  a  treaty  made  with 
Charles  V.,  513. 

Francis  de  Sales,  631. 

Francis  de  Victoria,  509. 

Frederic  I.  of  Cologne,  625. 

Free-thinking  and  Christianity,  213; 
Macaulay  on,  527. 

Friedlaender,  his  "Moeurs  Romaines" 
quoted,  259,  260,  407,  475,  578. 

Friedrich,  his  mission  to  Iceland,  306. 

Fronto,  142,  560. 

Froude  quoted,  in  regard  to  tlie  religious 
condition  of  the  Romans  in  the  time  of 
Caesar,  42. 

Fugitives  from  slavery,  or  political  op- 
pression, see  Strangers,  etc. 

"  Fruits  of  the  Spirit,"  271. 

Fundanus,  daughter  of,  473. 

Future  life  :  Christian  belief  in,  90,  91. 
93,  94  ;  notes,  Stanley,  Taylor,  429. 
Views  of,  held  by  the  Greeks  and  Ro- 
mans, 91 ;  notes,  Plato,  Aristotle,  Cicero, 
Sulpicius,  Seneca,  Pliny,  Lucretius,  Hor- 
ace, Epictetus,  Plutarch,  Marcus  Aurelius, 
421-426.  Modern  sceptical  view,  91  ; 
notes,  Clifford  426,  Reade  623,  Allu- 
sions to,  on  ancient  tombs,  91,  92 ;  notes, 
Rossi,  Taylor,  427.  Egyptian  doctrine 
of,  92.  Renouf  quoted,  428.  Buddhist 
view,  92 ;  the  significance  of  Nirvana, 
notes,  Bumouf,  Davids,  MQUer,  428 ; 
note  on  Confucius,  by  Legge,  429. 


Gabriel,  the  angel,  held  to  have  dictate* 
the  Koran,  218. 


652 


INDEX. 


Gaius,  ♦'  Institutes"  quoted,  464,  470,  471, 
485,  488,  503.  On  the  Voconian  law,  471. 

Galerius,  his  crimes  and  persecutions, 
296,  304,  325,  548.  "  De  Mort.  Persecut," 
quoted,  613. 

Gallienus,  fetes  of,  576. 

Gallus,  304. 

Gamaliel,  639. 

Gautama,  Gotama  or  Gaudama,  7,  55,  75, 
no.  Bigandet,  "  Legend  of  Gaudama  " 
quoted,  128,  363,  457,  564.  On  the  soul, 
Davids  quoted,  428. 

Gavius  of  Cosa,  crucified,  487. 

Gelasius  of  Rome,  his  litany,  452. 

Geneva  Conventions  of  1864  and  1868,  205  ; 
"  The  Red  Cross  of  the  Geneva  Conven- 
tion" quoted,  522.  The  Geneva  Tri- 
bunal of  1871-2, 178. 

Genius,  213,  214.  The  writings  of  emi- 
nent authors  in  ancient  times  preserved 
in  the  archives  of  the  state,  Plutarch  quo- 
ted, 527. 

Genseric,  305. 

Gentilis,  509.     His  definition  of  war,  519. 

Gerbert,  549. 

Germany,  chastity  of  the  women  in  ancient 
times,  151 ;  Tacitus  quoted,  475.  The 
Germanic  dialects,  Wnitney  quoted,  565. 
War  between  Germany  and  France  in 
1871,  175,  176. 

G^ROME,  328. 

Gibbon  and  Christianity,  211.  His  charac- 
ter and  the  spirit  of  his  historical  work, 
Martineau  and  Lecky  quoted,  383,  Com- 
pared with  Neander,  238.  On  the  belief 
in  miracles,  2:).  On  the  worship  at  An- 
tioch,  38.  His  characterization  of  the 
Roman  Cffisars,  188,  508.  On  Chinese 
grammars,  239,  His  "  Decline  and  Fall 
of  the  Roman  Empire  "  quoted,  39,  139, 
156,  205,  393,  356,  470,  508,  523,  556, 
590,  592.  His  Miscellaneous  works  quoted, 
508,  558,  577.  579.  References  to,  275, 
565. 

Gieseler,  548,  592. 

Giotto,  552. 

Girardin  quoted,  275. 

GiSLEBERT,  563, 

Glaber,  quoted  by  Michelet,  620. 

Gladiatorial  exhibitions,  258 ;  noies^  Va- 
lerius Maximus,  Wallon,  576,  577.  The 
Colosseum  and  other  amphitheatres,  259  ; 
notes^  Merivale,  Gibbon,  577.  -  Slaves 
trained  for  the  combats,  159.  Women 
engaged  in  them,  notes,  476.  Pliny  ap- 
plauds his  friend  Maximus  for  celebrating 
the  death  of  his  wife  with  one,  150  ;  Pliny 
quoted,  472,  Seneca  on,  261 ;  quoted, 
580.  Cicero  and  others  on,  260,  261. 
Forbidden,  162.  Extinction  of,  by  Chris- 
tianity, Lecky  quoted,  596. 


Gluttony,  fantastic,  in  ancient  times,  254 
notes,  569. 

Gnipho,  478. 

Gnosticism,  131,  336,  361.  The  Pleroma, 
338. 

God,  the  new  conception  of,  introduced  bj 
Christianity,  35-63  ;  notes,  381-408. 

Spiritual  value  of  a  just  and  inspiring 
conception  of  God,  35,  36.  Innate  sense 
of,  in  man,  37  ;  notes,  Miiller,  Plutarch, 
381.  Christian  conception  of  His  person- 
ality, 45-47.  His  unity,  47-49.  Resem- 
blances to  the  doctrine  of  the  unity,  47, 
48  ;.  notes,  Dollinger,  Haug,  398  ;  Hedge, 
MuUer,  Parker,  400.  The  Trinity,  48. 
His  eternity,  49-51.  Purity  the  basal  ele- 
ment of  His  character,  52.  His  holiness 
and  intolerance  of  sin,  53-55.  His  infinite 
love,  55-57 ;  Pascal  quoted,  403.  The 
Christian  conception  of  His  fatherhood, 
57.  58 ;  notes  on  the  name  of  "  Father," 
Miiller,  Luther,  Coulanges,  V/hitney, 
Hearn,  404,  405.  The  new  conception  of 
God  not  yet  universal,  60,  61.  Change 
wrought  in  Christendom  by  it,  61,  62 ; 
note,  Friedlaender,  406,  407.  Its  effect 
on  the  life  of  mankind,  62,  63 ;  notes,  F. 
Newman  407,  Martineau  408.  A  dis- 
tinct apprehension  of  the  Christian  doc- 
trine of  God's  attributes  indispensable  to 
any  conviction  of  a  progressive  unity  in 
history,  285.  See  World's  Hope  op 
Progress. 

"God's  Peace,"  "God's  Truce,"  Guizot 
quoted,  506. 

Godet,  "Commentary  on  the  Gospel  of 
St.  John  "  quoted,  362,  626. 

Goethe,  211,  223.  On  the  Book  of  Ruth, 
235.  On  nature,  288,  599.  On  faith, 
371.  The  prophet  and  the  poet,  541. 
Verses  on  Sakoontald,  565. 

Gogerly,  564.  • 

Golden  Age,  Virgil's  fourth  eclogue  re- 
ferred to,  316 ;  quoted,  600.  Neale  on 
the  prophecies  in  the  PoUio  of  Virgil,  624. 

Golden  Rule,  and  other  Christian  pre- 
cepts ;  parallels  of,  in  the  Ethnic  religions, 
86 ;  notes,  Thornton,  Legge,  Davids,  Har- 
dy, Aristotle,  Plato,  419,  420  ;  Jones,  628. 
See  Maxims. 

Gospels  and  Epistles  :  Christianity  ar- 
ticulate in  them,  5. 

The  fourth  Gospel,  tho  most  spiritually 
profound  book  in  human  literature,  88. 
The  writer's  intuitive,  interpreting  spirit, 
225.  Its  authorship,  216  ;  Luthardt  quo- 
ted,  528.  Date  assigned  to  it,  3  ;  notes, 
Abbott,  Luthardt,  Godet,  361,  362;  Ebrard 
on  the  Johannine  narrative,  331  ;  Godet 
quoted,  625,  626.  Origen  on  the  power  of 
the  Gospels,  612,  613.  The  Zoe  of  the 
Gospels,  90. 

The  four  unquestioned  epistles  of  St. 
Paul,  222.  His  splendid  dialectical  ener- 
gy, 225  ;  notes,  Martineau,  Baur,  Arnold 


INDEX. 


653 


540,  541.  Supposed  relations  between 
him  and  Seneca,  232,  253  ;  Troplong  quo- 
ted, 547.  Represented  to  have  visited 
the  tomb  of  Virgil,  Neale  quoted,  624. 
Aug:ustine  on  the  references  by  St.  Paul  to 
heathen  writers,  629.  Romans  i.  14, 
quoted,  166.  Quotes  Aratus,  331.  His 
nature,  249.  Liddon's  reference  to  his 
conversion,  630.  His  letter  to  the  Corin- 
thians showing  vices  of  heathenism,  249- 
251 ;  Stanley  quoted,  567.  On  subjection 
to  the  higher  powers,  187,  188.  Pleads 
before  Felix  and  Festus,  188.  On  the 
common  origin  of  man,  190.  He  speaks 
of  bearing  joyfully  the  stigmata  of  Christ, 
158.  Referred  to,  119,  150,  152,  215,  254, 
268,  271,  281,  291,  334,  356,  639. 

St.  Peter  the  undoubted  author  of  the 
first  Epistle  attributed  to  him,  215  ;  note, 
528.  Referred  to,  77,  113,  120,  271,  281. 
Sceptical  view  of  the  lessons  of  Jesus,  as 
propagated  by  Peter  and  Paul ;  Wise 
quoted,  632.  See  Bible. 
Greece,  nature  of  the  worship  there  when 
Christianity  was  presented  to  man,  38 ; 
notes,  Apuleius,  Strabo,  Athenaeus,  382, 
383.  Greek  theory  of  the  origin  and  des- 
tiny of  the  human  race,  71,  72 ;  notes, 
Plato,  Euripides,  Thucydides,  410.  Philo- 
sophical regard  for  the  rare  and  cultured 
in  man,  73,  74 ;  notes,  Plato,  Aristotle, 
Tacitus,  411.  isio  body  of  law  and  truth 
declared  by  the  gods  for  man's  acceptance, 
80 ;  notes,  Plato,  Grote,  Curtius,  414, 
415.  Zeus,  Poseidon ;  their  functions, 
81  ;  7tofe  on,  by  Grote,  415.  No  intellect- 
ual capacity  required  of  the  priests,  for 
advice  or  edification  ;  notes,  Renan,  D61- 
linger,  418.  Greek  views  of  the  future 
life,  91 ;  notes,  Horace,  Euripides,  Epic- 
tetus,  Plutarch,  425,  426.  The  offerings 
to  the  gods,  107  ;  note,  Dollinger,  436. 
Human  expiatory  sacrifices ;  notes,  Plu- 
tarch, Pausanius,  and  others,  439.  Greek 
music,  116;  notes,  MahalTy,  444;  Chap- 
pell,  Grote,  445.  The  oracle  of  Tropho- 
nius,  127 ;  notes,  Pausanius,  Mahaffy, 
456.  The  treatment  of  children  in  Greece, 
140 ;  notes,  461,  462.  Women,  148 ;  notes, 
467,  468.  Slavery,  155-158 ;  notes,  479- 
484.  Usages  of  war,  174  ;  notes,  498,  499. 
Treatment  of  Heralds  and  Ambassadors, 
176,  177  ;  notes^  Herodotus,  Pausanius, 
Thucydides,  500.  Hellenic  confederacies 
and  inter-political  regulations,  180,  181 ; 
notes,  Grote,  Plato,  502.  The  genius  and 
intellectual  activity  of  Greece,  214  ;  Plu- 
tarch quoted,  527.  No  sacred  books,  218. 
Greek  literature,  231,  232 ;  notes,  544- 
546.  Greek  education,  240 ;  notes,  560, 
561.  Greek  moral  life  as  pictured  by  St. 
Paul,  249-251 ;  Stanley  quoted,  567.  No 
systematic  benevolence  in,  272.  Its  be- 
lief in  fate,  without  expectation  for  the 
future  of  mankind,  287-289 ;  notes  on 
Nemesis  by  Dollinger  and  Symonds,  598. 
Modem  approach  to  the  Greek  conception 


of  fatality,  Goethe  quoted,  28S,  599.  No 
power  for  self-development  in  the  Athe- 
nian democracy,  Grote  quoted,  224.  Ai. 
nold  on  the  fall  of  Greece,  623.  Circu* 
lation  and  authority  of  Greek  ideas,  344; 
notes,  Cicero,  Mommsen,  632,  633.  Ca- 
reer of  Alexander  the  Great,  342,  343; 
Plutarch  quoted,  632. 

Greece,  autonomy  of,  in  1827,  193. 

Greek  antholog^y  quoled,  289. 

Gregory  I.,  the  Great,  and  ecclesiastical 
music,  117 ;  note,  Montalembert,  446. 
His  hymns,  119.  Gregorian  chants,  131. 
His  instructions  in  regard  to  liturgies. 
Bede  quoted,  452.  His  manumission  01 
slaves,  162 ;  quotations  from  the  deed 
of  manumission,  491 ;  notes^  Robertson, 
Hallam,  492. 

Gregory  VII.  (Hildebrand),  his  origin, 
98;  Villemain  quoted,  431.  References 
to,  153,  309,  310. 

Gregory  Nazianzen,  119,  153,  231,  496, 
549- 

Gregory  Thaumaturgus  on  the  study  of 
Greek  literature,  231 ;  quoted,  546. 

Gregory  of  Tours,  549. 

Grote,  his  "  History  of  Greece  "  quoted  ; 
on  the  Zeus  of  the  Greeks,  81,  415  ;  on 
inter-political  regulations,  181,  502  ;  on 
the  want  of  power  for  self-development 
in  the  Athenian  democracy,  224 ;  on  the 
authorship  of  the  second  Aldbiades,  345  ; 
on  the  Mythes,  366 ;  on  the  music  of  the 
Greeks,  445 ;  on  Prometheus,  473 ;  on 
the  Sibylline  prophecies,  535. 

Grotius,  his  life  and  work,  191 ;  notes  on 
his  "  Law  of  Nations,"  Mackintosh,  Hal- 
lam, Burigny,  509,  510.  Phillimore,  511. 
His  rules  for  treaties,  195. 

GuiENNE,  Duke  of,  513. 

GuizOT,  his  "History  of  Civilization" 
quoted,  162,  562;  on  the  attainments  of 
Alcuin,  559.  His  "History  of  France" 
quoted,  182 ;  on  "  God's  Truce,"  506 ;  on 
Francis  I.,  513. 

Guru  Govind,  438. 

Gutenberg's  Bible,  232,  550. 

Gyges,  ring  of,  meaning  of,  568. 

Gylippus,  498. 


Haarlem,  206,  524. 

Hades,  93,  425. 

Hadley,  his  "Roman  Law"  quoted,  471 
498. 

Hadrian,  3,  142,  159,  161,  242,  256,  440^ 
441,  463,  492,  563,  609.  Tradition  of  hi| 
dedication  of  temples  to  Christ,  274,  592. 

Hall,  556. 

Hallam,  492,  509,  563. 

Hammond,  452. 


654: 


INDEX. 


Handbook,  Murray's,  of  Rome,  574. 

Hannibal,  174,  293,  633. 

Hanseatic  League,  1S4. 

Hardwick,  his  "Christ  and  Other  Mas- 
ters "  quoted,  2S2,  300,  600,  627. 

Hardy,  564,  627;  his  "Legends  of  the 
Buddhists"  quoted,  363;  "Manual  of 
Buddhism,"  389,  419,  420. 

Hartwig,  "  Harmonies  of  Nature" 
quoted,  401,  404. 

Haug,  "Essays  on  the  Parsis"  quoted, 
365,  398,  533.  His  translation  of  the 
Avesta  quoted,  414.  On  Vedic  hymns, 
437. 

Hawkins,  "History  of  Music"  quoted, 
444,  446. 

Hearn,  his  "Aryan  Household,"  405,  459, 
485,  507- 

Heathenism,  religious  condition  of  the 
world  under,  when  Christianity  appeared, 
37-44.;  notes,  382-396.  Education  un- 
der, and  the  contrcist  of  Christianity,  241 


245;  notes,  560-5 


Its  moral  life  at 


the  time  Christianity  appeared,  249-263  ; 
notes,  569-5S2.  See  Ethnic  Relig- 
ions, afid  under  names  0/  countries  and 
systems. 

Heavenly  Father.    See  Father. 

Heber,  Bishop,  referred  to,  438. 

Hebrews,  their  conception  of  God,  46; 
of  the  unity  of  God,  48,  4:0.  The  "  Fear 
of  the  Lord,"  the  predominant  sentiment 
in  their  worship,  52,  53.  The  Agrarian 
Law,  the  basis  of  their  civil  constitution, 
76.  Their  recognition  of  human  dignity 
limited  to  the  Hebrew  State,  76,  77.  The 
Law,  and  their  fathers,  81,  82  ;  Kant 
qOoted,  82,  416.  Their  ritual  of  sacrifice, 
and  its  expiatoiy  meaning,  105-107. 
Their  law  of  sacrifice,  108,  109;  Ewald 
quoted,  438.  The  Hebrew  Temple,  123, 
124.  Their  psalms  and  music,  116 ; 
Parker  quoted,  449.  Children,  with 
them,  the  heritage  of  the  Lord,  143,  144. 
Women  under  the  Hebrew  system,  146, 
147  ;  notes,  466,  467.  Hebrew  literature, 
235.  Their  moral  life,  and  their  perse- 
cution under  the  Empire,  264,  265  ;  Uhl- 
hom  quoted,  583.  Their  hope  for  hu- 
manity, and  the  Messianic  doctrine,  296- 
299 ;  notes,  Josephus,  Bacon,  Renan, 
Strauss,  606,  607.  The  relation  of  Ju- 
daism to  Christianity,  53,  337,  338; 
notes,  Renan,  Liddon,  Channing,  Dor- 
ner,  630,  631.  The  dispersion  of  the 
Hebrew  people,  346,  347 ;  notes.  Light- 
foot,  Augustine,  Josephus,  635.  Gama- 
liel, 639.    See  Moses. 

Hecataeus  of  Miletus,  80. 

Hedge  on  Theism,  400. 

Heffter,  "Das  Europaische  Volker- 
recht"  quoted,  190,  508. 

Heidelberg  catechism,  120. 


Hellenic  temples,  Dollinger  quoted,  455 

See  Greece. 
H£loise,  153. 

Helots,  treatment  of,  158  ;  notes,  484, 
Helvia,  263. 
Helvidius,  253. 
Henry  IL,  167. 
Henry  IV.,  514.     His  scheme  for  courts  ol 

Arbitration,  206 ;  notes,  525. 
Henry  V.,  625. 
Henry  VII.,  141,  514. 
Hepldann,  549. 

Heraclitus,   48,  610;  quoted  by  Zeller, 

388,  399  ;  Dollinger  quoted,  609, 
Heralds  and  Envoys,    176,    177  ;  notes y 

500,  501.     Roman  heralds,  181. 
Herbert  of  Cherbury,  535. 
Herman  of  Dalmatia,  559. 
Herodotus,  38,  224,  568.    Quoted,  3S2, 

437,  460,  499,  500,  600. 
Hesiod  quoted,  431. 
Heyne,  his  theory  of  the  Homeric  poems, 

30- 
HiLAiRE.    See  Saint  Hilaire, 
Hilary  of  Poictiers,  119. 
Hildebert,  549. 

Hildebrand.    See  Gregory  VH. 
Hildegarde,  153. 
Hindu  drama,  243;  Williams  quoted,  564, 

565.     Verses  on  Sakoontali  by  Goethe, 

565. 
Hindu  religions.    See  Vedas,  Brahmanic 

System,  Buddhism. 
Hippocrates,  460. 

HiPPOLYTUS,  491. 

Hipponicus,  483. 

Historians,  Christian,  237,  238  ;  note,  by 

Gibbon,  on  Monkish  historiams,  558. 
History,  philosophy  of,  285. 
Hodgkin,  his    "Italy  and  her  Invaders" 

quoted,  505,  552. 
Holland,   the    Dutch  and    the  Pilgrims, 

312  ;  Bradford  quoted,  621. 
Holyoake  quoted,  70,  409,  433. 
Homer,  60,  214,  223,  232,  287,  372,  406, 

429,  473,  482,  534,  553. 
Homeric    poems,    theory   of   Wolf   and 

Heyne  in  regard  to  them,  30. 
Hooker  quoted,  185. 
Hope  of  progress.    See  World's  Hope. 
Horace,  42,  91,  157,  253,  293,  391,  407, 

425,  481,  487,  549,  569,  633. 
HoR^.    See  Books  of  Hours. 
Horns  of  Hattin,  54. 
HoRTENSius,  252,  256,  567,  571. 
Hospitals  under  Christianity,  167,  329 


INDEX. 


655 


no'es,  Monialembert,  Lecky,  496.  The 
sick  and  the  crippled  sheltered,  273; 
nctes,  Apostolical  Constitutions,  St.  Je- 
rome, Eusebius,  Gibbon,  589,  590.  Hospi- 
tals unknown  among  the  heathen,  591. 

Hours  of  prayer.    See  Books  of  Hours. 

Huguenots,  121,  312. 

HuLDAH,  147. 

Humboldt  quoted,  235;  his  "Cosmos" 
quoted,  555. 

Hume,  his  "Essay  on  Miracles"  referred 
to,  565. 

Humphreys,  his  "  Art  of  Printing '"  quoted, 
550. 

Hutu  Catalogue  referred  to,  453. 

Huxley  quoted,  536 ;  his  translation  from 
Goethe  quoted,  599. 

Hymnody,  118,  119;  «^/(?j,  447-451.  An- 
tiphonal  hymns,  117 ;  their  origin,  Soc- 
rates' "Eccl.  History  "  quoted,  445.  An- 
cient Greek  hymn  cited  by  Basil,  119  ; 
notes,  Coleman,  and  an  Enghsh  version, 
450.  An  early  Latin  hymn  quoted,  131  ; 
Trench  quoted,  458.  The  Gloria  in  Ex- 
celsis,  119;  Bunsen  quoted,  450.  Hymn 
of  Clement,  119 ;  two  stanzas  of,  in  Dex- 
ter's  translation,  450.  Mediaeval  hymns, 
311.  Apostolical  hymns,  references  to, 
449,  450.  Hebrew  hymns,  46  ;  Parker 
quoted,  440.  Early  Greek  and  Latin 
hymn  write'rs,  119.  Daniel,  "Thesaurus 
Hymnologicus "  quoted,  450.  Trench, 
"Sacred  Latin  Poetiy," quoted,  451,  458. 

Hypocrisy,  the  maxim  of  Rochefoucauld 
quoted,  195.     Burke  quoted,  523. 

Hystaspes,  Books  of,  544. 


IBN  Khaldoun  on  the  Qurdn,  533. 

Iceland,  mission  to,  3o5. 

Ideal  of  Christian  worship,  carried  into 
life,  132. 

Ignatius,  120,  362 ;  quoted,  275,  475,  592, 
594- 

Iliad,  on  the  souls  of  departed  heroes, 
Stanley  quoted,  429. 

Imier,  St.,  and  the  town  of  that  name, 
507  ;  Montalembert  quoted,  617. 

Immortality  of  man,  the  Christian  con- 
ception, 99.  Ancient  views,  notes,  431. 
Modern  sceptical  views  of,  notes,  Chiist- 
lieb,  Reade,  Strauss,  Mill,  432,  433.  Clif- 
ford quoted,  426,  Christian  inscriptions 
in  the  catacombs,  587.  References  to  the 
subject,  227,  321,  330,  339.  See  Future 
Life. 

Importance,  and  effect  of  a  just  concep- 
tion of  God,  35,  36. 

-India,  its  jurisprudence  and  literature, 
Schlegel  quoted,  289,  290.  Its  poetry, 
243 ;  notes,  Williams,  564,  and  verses  by 
Goethe  on  Sakoontald,   565.    The  San- 


scrit language,  notes,  Maine,  Jones,  638 
See  Brahmanic   System,    BuddhisMi 
Sacred  Books,  Vedas. 
Indians,  American,  missions  to,  114 ;  Park« 

man  quoted,  444. 
Infant    baptism,    145;    notes,   464,   465. 

Communion,  145  ;  notes,  465,  466. 
Infidelity,  modern  ;  The  Divine  and  par 
amount  claims  of  Christianity  denied  by 
able  men,  8 ;  ttotes,  Parker,  Strauss,  365. 
Poetical  pantheism,  46;   Parker  quoted, 
397.     Atheistic  view  of  the  Creator,  Clif- 
ford quoted,   408.      Special  Providence 
denied,  Holyoake  quoted,  70,  409.    Scep- 
tical view  of    immortality,   91 ;    Clifford 
quoted,  426.    Materialism  and  Pessimism, 
99  ;  }iotes,  Vogt,  Moleschott,  Feuerbach, 
Czolbe,  Reade,  ScUeiermacher,  Strauss, 
Mill,   432,   433.      Sceptical  writers :  the 
character  of  Gibbon  and  the  spirit  of  his 
historical  work,  7iotes,  Lecky,  Martineau, 
383  ;  compared  with  Neander,  23S  ;  deis- 
tical  works  of    the  eighteenth  century, 
565,   566.      Christian   morality   criticised 
by  Mill,  597.      Modern  approach  to  the 
Greek  conception  of  fatality,  Goethe  quo- 
ted, 288,  599.     Scepticism  uniformly  pes- 
simistic,  315 ;  hopelessness  of  unbelief, 
Reade  quoted,   623.     St.  John's  Gospel 
regarded   as   a   poetical   romance,   331 ; 
Godet  quoted,  626,     Infidel  explanation 
of  the  development  of  Christianity,  Reade 
and  Wise  quoted,  631,  632. 
Influences,    unconscious,    on    illustrious 
minds  in  Christendom,  admitting  no  per- 
sonal indebtedness  to  its  rehgion,  212. 
Ingratitude,  Seneca  quoted,  589. 
INGULPHUS,  Chronicle  quoted,  on  the  en- 
tertainment  of    strangers,    516 ;    on   the 
Abbey  of  Croyland,  562,  563. 
Injustice,  Plato  on,  254  ;  Socrates  quoted, 

420.     Voltaire  quoted,  514. 
Innocent,  Popes,  309,  505. 
Inspiration  of  poets,  attributed  by  the  au' 
cients  to  a  possessing  divinity,  80  ;  notes, 
Plato,  Grote,  Curtius,  414,  415. 
Instinct  of  the  brute,  and  reason  of  man, 

the  gulf  between,  341. 
Insurrection,  temper  of,  Burke  quoted, 

205. 
Intellectual  power  and  culture  of  man- 
kind ;  the  effect  produced  by  Christianity, 
211-245  ;  7iates,  527-566. 
International  Law,  impulse  given  to  it 
by  Christianity,  179;  notes,  Sa\ngny, 
Ward,  501.  No  organized  development 
of  it  possible  in  the  ancient  world,  179, 
180  ;  Parker  quoted,  501.  Inter-politica] 
regulations  of  the  Greek  States,  180,  181 ; 
7iote  on  the  Amphictyonic  assembly,  Grote, 
Gurtius,  502.  No  obligations  recognized 
by  the  Greeks  outside  the  Hellenic  con« 
federacy,  181 ;  notes,  Plato,  Plutarch, 
^Eschylus,  502.    The  Jus  Civile  and  the 


666 


INDEX. 


Jus  Gentium  of  Rome,  i8i ;  Gaius  quo-  | 
ted,  503.  The  first  opportunity  for  devel- 
oping a  Law  between  nations,  181.  The 
earliest  definition  of  it,  181.  Influence 
of  Christianity  shown  by  the  reference  to 
councils,  of  questions  in  dispute  between 
princes,  181,  182 ;  Voltaire  quoted,  503. 
The  condition  of  Europe  during  the  cen- 
turies immediately  following  the  fall  of 
the  Western  empire,  182-184  ;  notes^  Sis- 
mondi,  Ammianus  Marcellinus,  Renan, 
Ozanam,  Bryce,  Hodgkin,  503-505.  In- 
fluence of  Bernard  of  Clairvaux,  183, 
184;  notes^  Neander,  Calvin,  505,  506. 
Slow  progress  of  International  Law,  184  ; 
notes,  Guizot,  Bluntschli,  506.  Definition 
of,  and  conditions  of  its  authority,  185 ; 
notes,  Heam,  Wheaton,  Cairns,  Woolsey, 
507.  Ethnic  religions  unfriendly  to  it, 
186 ;  the  Koran  quoted,  508,  Its  form- 
ation and  advance  under  Christianity, 
186-191 ;  Bluntschli  on  Christianity  and 
the  fundamental  propositions  of  Interna- 
tional Law,  507 ;  and  Heffter  on  its  au- 
thority, sanction,  and  obligations,  509.  St. 
Paul  on  subjection  to  the  higher  powers, 
and  the  Divine  functions  of  rulers,  187- 
189;  notes,  Voltaire,  quoted  by  Gibbon, 
on  the  Roman  Caesars  and  Roman  wor- 
ship ;  and  Montaigne  quoted,  508.  Gro- 
tius,  the  author  of  the  first  enduring 
text-book  of  the  Law,  191 ;  tiotes  on  Gro- 
tius,  and  other  writers  on  the  Law  of 
nations,  509,  510.  The  governing  prin- 
ciples and  application  of  the  Law,  192- 
194  ;  notes,  510-512.  See  Ambassadors, 
Treaties,  Private  International 
Law. 

Inter-political  regulations  of  the  an- 
cient Greek  states,  181. 

Inter-stellar  spaces  of  a  supreme  si- 
lence, 230. 

IPHIGENEIA,  288. 

Iran,  scriptures  of,  532. 

Iren^us,  120,  528 ;  quoted,  372,  464. 

Isidore  of  Pelusium,  491. 

Isidore  of  Seville,  author  of  the  earliest 

definition  of  a  law  between  nations,  181. 
Isis,  temple  of,  296. 
Islam.    See  Mohammedanism. 
Italy,  poetry,   painting,  and  architecture 

in,  233,  234  ;  notes,  552-554. 


Jacob,  "  Hebrew  Pantheism"  quoted,  456. 

Jam£S  I.,  sculpture  of  his  daughter  in  West- 
minster Abbey,  141. 

James  de  Benedictis,  119. 

James,  St.,  Liturgy  of,  122;  notes,  452. 

Jameson,  "Legends  of  the  Monastic  Or- 
ders" quoted,  443,  625.  • 

Jerome,  St.,  153,  232,  302,  549,  559.  On 
singing,    118 ;    Bingham    quoted,    449. 


Teaches  how  to  train  children,  477.  Hi» 
reference  to  Seneca,  253;  quoted,  568- 
Eulogy  on  Paul  the  hermit,  583,  584.  Od 
the  hospital  founded  by  Fabiola,  589, 
590,  591. 

Jerusalem,  destruction  of,  298 ;  Josephua 
quoted,  606.  End  of  the  outward  exist- 
ence of  the  Jewish  nationality,  Uhlhom 
quoted,  583. 

Jesuits,  in  North  America,  114 ;  Parkma» 
quoted,  444 ;  in  India  and  China,  56^ 
Suarez,  a  Jesuit  of  Granada,  the  authos 
of  "  Tractatus  de  legibus  ac  Deo  legisla* 
tore,"  Hallam  quoted,  509. 

Jesus.    See  Chrfst. 

Jews.    See  Hebrews. 

JOFFRID,  Abbot,  Ingulphus  quoted,  563. 

John,  St.    See  Gospels. 

John  of  Damascus,  119. 

John  XXII.,  495. 

Johnson,  Dr.,  308. 

Jcnes,  Sir  William,  quoted,  19,  372,  41J, 
439,  463,  469,  539.  628,  638. 

JOSEPHUS,  quoted,  157,  346,  351,  401,  606^ 
635. 

JOWETT,  480, 

Judaism.    See  Hebrews. 

Judas  the  Gaulonite,  630. 

Julia,  Csesar's  daughter,  her  tomb  smittea 

by  a  thunderbolt,  294. 
Julia  Augusta,  572. 
Julia  Domna,  219. 
Julia  Mammsea,  592. 
Julian,  109,  152,  232,  305,  442,  549. 

Jus  Gentium  ;  Jus  Civile,  181 ;  Gaius  quo- 
ted, 503. 

Jus  POSTLIMINII,  175. 

Justin  Martyr,  120,  301,  304.  On  sub- 
jection to  rulers,  189.  Christ  intimated 
in  Socrates,  335.  On  prophecies,  22; 
quoted,  372.  On  unchastity,  385.  In  re* 
gard  to  Plato  and  the  doctiine  of  God, 
40  ;  quoted,  3S8.  Christians  called  athe- 
ists, 434,  On  the  primitive  worship  by 
Christians,  435,  436.  On  animal  sacri- 
fices, 108 ;  quoted,  441.  On  exposing 
newly-born  children,  464.  Children  as 
believers,  465.  Divine  inspiration  in  an- 
cient philosophy,  232  ;  quoted,  544.  His 
conversion,  274  ;  quoted,  589.  Eifect  ol 
Christian  martyrdoms,  278  ;  quoted,  596. 
On  the  use  of  the  literature  of  Greece  and 
Rome,  303;  quoted,  610.  God,  the  end 
of  Plato's  philosophy,  345  ;  quoted,  634. 

Justinian,  his  Institutes,  Pandects,  Code, 
and  Novellae  referred  to,  344,  348.  In 
regard  to  slaves,  162,  491,  492.  Refei- 
ences,  549,  552. 

Juvenal,  on  gluttony,  254.  Satirises  th*: 
Jews,  264.     Quotes  a  Roman  prediction. 


INDEX. 


657 


4/92.  On  the  licentiousness  of  the  times, 
39 ;  quoted,  384.  On  the  prevailing  un- 
belief, 42  ;  quoted,  392.  On  the  worship 
of  monsters,  399.  On  the  instruction  of 
children,  463.  On  modesty  in  women, 
476.  On  cruelty  to  slaves,  159 ;  quoted, 
486,  487.  On  divorce,  255 ;  quoted,  571. 
On  the  demoralization  of  his  time,  261 ; 
quoted,  579. 


Kanjur  and  Tanjur,  the  sacred  books  of 
the  Thibetans,  530. 

Kansan,  628. 

Kant  on  the  starry  heavens  and  the  moral 
law,  82  ;  quoted,  416,  420.  On  courts  for 
arbitration,  206,  526.  On  the  command 
*'  Love  God,"  495. 

Karileff,  307. 

Kaulbach,  cartoon  by,  of  an  early  per- 
secution in  Rome,  281. 

Keim,  his  "Jesus  of  Nazara"  referred  to, 
361. 

Kennedy  :  Hulsean  Essay  quoted,  181. 

Kennet,  559. 

Khilkof,  515. 

Kingsley,  584. 

Klonas,  445. 

Kong-tse  (Confucius).    See  China. 

Koran.    See  Sacred  Books. 

Kostlin,  361. 

Krapf,  564. 

Krishna,  332 ;  account  of,  the  "  Bhaga- 

vad-Gita  "  quoted,  627,  628. 
Kuenen  quoted,  338,  413,  637. 

T^aboulaye  quoted  on  the  moral  code  of 
Buddhism,  627. 

Lacordaire  on  Christ,  377, 

Lactantius  on  the  meaning  of  the  word 
"religion,"  366.  On  human  sacrifices, 
108  ;  quoted,  441.  On  killing  new-bom 
children,  464.  On  the  treatment  of  slaves 
and  captives,  161,  162  ;  quoted,  489,  490. 
On  ApoUonius,  535.  On  Cicero,  547. 
Early  Christian  regard  for  good  learn- 
ing. 548.  The  philosophy  of  Seneca,  253 ; 
quoted,  567.  On  the  persecutions  by  Ga- 
lerius,  304  ;  account  of,  613. 

Laeta,  taught  how  to  train  her  child  by  St. 

Jerome,  477. 
Lais,  396. 
Lalemant,  444. 

La  Mennais:  his  "  Essai  sur  I'lndiff^- 
rence  "  quoted,  375,  615,  616. 

Lampridius,  274. 

Landscape,  love  of,  and  of  nature,  in  har- 
mony with  the  Gospel,  235  ;  Schiller  and 
Humboldt  quoted,  554,  555. 


Language  of  Christian  thought,  131 
Structure  and  style  of  the  language  of 
the  Bible,  225,  226;  noies,  Newman, 
Jones,  Pascal,  Rousseau,  Coleridge,  538- 
540.  Linguistic  studies  under  Christian- 
ity ,  239,  240.  Ozanam  quoted,  559,  560. 
The  inferiority  of  the  Latin  language  to 
the  Greek  acknowledged  by  Roman  wri- 
ters, 344  ;  notes,  Cicero,  Mommsen,  632, 
633.  The  Germanic  dialects,  565.  The 
Sanscrit ;  Maine  and  Jones  quoted,  638. 
The  Pali  language,  420.  The  use  of 
words  to  disguise  thought,  Voltaire 
quoted,  514. 

Lao-tse,  or  Laou-tsze.    See  China. 
Lapi,  549. 

La    Place,  his  "  M^canique  C61este  "  re» 

ferred  to,  229,  543,  544. 
Lardner,  535. 
Larentina,  396. 
Lasaulx,  Ernst  von,  quoted,  440. 
Latin  language.    See  Language. 
Latin  poetry,  119, 131.    Trench's  "  Sacred 

Latin  Poetry  "  quoted,  451,  458. 

Laughing  and  sneers  at  the  ancient  gods 

and  sacrifices  ;  Cicero  and  Gibbon  quoted, 

393. 
Laurentius  presents  the  poor  and  sick 

who  had  been  nourished,  as  the  treasures 

of  the  Roman  Church,  273. 
Laureolus,  578. 

Law  of  obedience,  272.  Petronian  law 
488.  Voconian  law,  149;  notes,  471. 
The  Moral  law,  82 ;  Kant  quoted,  416, 
420.  The  Lex  Julia  et  Papia  Poppaea^ 
470.  The  Lex  Pompeia  de  paricidiiSy 
463.  Codes  of  Pagan  Emperors,  Oza- 
nam quoted,  504.  A  Law  universal,  207. 
See  International  law. 

Lazar- houses  and  hospitals  ;  first  estab- 
lished by  the  monks,  in  Europe,  167 ; 
notes,  496. 

Lecky  quoted  ;  his  "  History  of  Rational- 
ism," 30,  566,  622.  "  History  of  Euro- 
pean M9rals,"262,  276,  278,  375, 380,  383, 
497.  590- 

Legend  of  Gaudama.    See  Gautama. 

Legge,  Chinese  classics.    See  China. 

Leibnitz,  206,  526  ;  quoted  by  Phillimore, 
511. 

Lemuel,  mother  of,  147. 

Leo  the  Great,  325. 

Lepidus,  603. 

Lesche,  461. 

Lessing  on  enthusiasts,  526.    His  "Lao- 

coon  "  quoted,  553. 
Levesque  quoted,  515. 
Lewes,  345. 

LiBANIUS,  152, 


658 


INDEX. 


LiDDON,  449.  IBampton  Lectures  quoted, 
622,  630. 

LiEBER,  his  rules  of  war,  204 ;  quoted,  521. 

Light,  The,  which  lighteth  every  man ; 
the  •'  Desire  of  all  nations  "  :  334. 

Light  of  the  world,  356. 

LlGHTFOOT  quoted,  41,  635. 

Lincoln,  quotation  from  his  second  inau- 
gural address,  493. 

Linguistic  studies  under  Christianity,  239, 
240 ;  Ozanam  quoted,  559,  560.  See  Lan- 
guage. 

Litanies,  121 ;  Palmer  quoted,  452. 

Liturgies,  121,  122 ;  noies^  Hammond, 
Bede,  Palmer,  Neale,  45i-453«  Refer- 
ence to,  322. 

Livingstone,  564. 

Livy  on  the  neglect  of  the  worship  of  the 
gods,  42  ;  quoted,  391.  Romans  unable 
to  bear  their  vices  or  the  remedy  for 
them,  361 ;  quoted,  582.  References  to, 
480,  576  ;  quoted,  499,  534. 

Locke  on  miracles,  370.  On  the  Golden 
Rule,  419.     Reference  to,  566. 

•*  Logos";  meaning  and  appUcation  of  the 
term,  339,  340.  Domer  quoted,  631. 
Reference  to,  by  Justin  Martyr,  544. 

Lois,  152. 

Lombard,  242. 

Lord's-day  assembly  and  service,  and  the 
practical  service  of  life,  129. 

Lord's  prayer,  Luther  on,  404. 

Lord's  supper,  see  Eucharist.  Degraded 
by  the  Corinthians,  250. 

Louis,  St.,  184,  491. 

Louis  XL,  instruction  to  his  ambassadors, 
513- 

Love,  the  vital  element  of  holiness,  55. 
The  master-word  of  Christianity,  115. 
The  Law  to  love  all  men,  manifested  in 
systematic  benevolence,  272,  273 ;  notes, 
589,  590,  Kant  quoted  on  the  command, 
"Love  God,  and  thy  neighbor  as  thy- 
self," 495. 

Loyola,  509. 

LUBKE  :  "  History  of  Art'*  quoted,  551. 

Lucretius,  his  philosophy,  40;  quoted, 
387.  On  the  soul,  and  on  death,  91 ; 
quoted,  424,  425  ;  quoted,  295. 

LOCULLUS,  157. 

Lundy,  "Monumental  Christianity"  re- 
ferred to,  435. 

Lupus,  549. 

Luthardt,  on  St  John's  Gospel  quoted, 
362,  528. 

Luther  on  the  Apostles'  Creed,  451.  Latin 
inscription  on  a  house  at  Frankfort  on 
the  Maine,  where  he  is  reported  to  have 
preached,  311.     On  the  Lord's  prayer. 


404.     His  translation  of  the  Bible,  564 

On  Liturgies,  121. 
Lycurgus,  537. 
Lydia,  151. 
Lysias,  628. 

Mabillon,  453. 

Macaulay  quoted,  329,  527,  581. 

Macella,  593. 

Mackenzie,  Henry,  Hulsean  Essay  quotec^ 

557- 
Mackenzie,  Lord,   "Studies   in   Romas 

Law  "  quoted,  471. 
Mackintosh,  202,  509,  510,  519,  556, 
Macrina,  153. 
Macrinus,  263,  473. 

MiECENAS,  572. 

Magdeburg,  sackof,  ao6;  Schiller  quoted, 
523.  524. 

Mahaffy:  "Rambles  and  Studies  in 
Greece  "  quoted,  444,  456. 

Mahomet.    See  Mohammed. 

Maine:  "Ancient  Law"  quoted,  81. 
"Village  communities,"  469,  638. 

Man,  his  innate  sense  of  God,  37 ;  notes^ 
Muller,  Plutarch,  381.  His  knowledge  of 
himself  gained  from  Christianity,  68,  69. 
His  likeness  to  God,  69,  70.  Modem 
sceptical  views,  70,  71 ;  Holyoake  quoted, 
409,  Dissociated  from  a  Divine  originator 
in  the  ancient  world,  71,  72 ;  notes,  Plato, 
Euripides,  410.  His  consequent  tendency 
to  the  worship  of  the  forces  of  nature,  or 
to  human  worship,  72,  73 ;  Whitney 
quoted,  410.  This  tendency  matched 
against  the  first  teaching  of  Christianity, 
73.  Only  the  rare  and  cultured  of  their 
contemporaries  regarded  by  the  Greeks, 
73>  74 ;  notes,  Plato,  Aristotle,  Tacitus, 

411.  Under  the  Brahmanic  system,  74, 
75 ;  notes,  Jones,   Duncker,   Barth,  411, 

412.  Buddhist  view  of  man,  75 ;  notes, 
Muller,  Barth,  Oldenburg,  412,  413. 
Under  the  Hebrews  the  recognition  of 
human  worth  sharply  limited  to  their 
own  commonwealth,  76,  77.  Man  recog- 
nized without  distinction  under  Christian- 
ity, 77-80.  The  message  of  Divine  recog- 
nition, 81.  The  Divine  message  contrasted 
with  the  Law  of  the  Hebrew  system,  81, 
82.    The  Moral  Law,  82  ;   Kant  quoted, 

82,  416,  420.  Divine  recognition  of  man's 
nature,  83.   The  mission  of  Christ  to  man, 

83,  84,  93, 94;  Schaff  quoted,  416.  The  in- 
estimable worth  of  the  nature  of  man,  84. 
His  will  subject  to  the  state  under  earlier 
systems,  85  ;  Plato  quoted,  416,  417.  The 
sovereignty  of  his  will  recognized  by 
Christianity,  85 ;  Channing  quoted,  417 
Stoical  jdew,  85 ;  Seneca  quoted,  417. 
Christianity  offered  for  man's  voluntary 
acceptance,  85,  86.    The  appeal  through 


INDEX. 


659 


preaching  to  his  intellect  and  to  his 
conscience,  86-89 ;  Newman  quoted,  417 ; 
Parker  quoted,  420.  Preaching  unknown, 
except  the  Buddhist  teaching,  under  ethnic 
systems,  86,  87 ;  notes^  Renan,  Dollin- 
ger,  Thornton,  Legge,  Davids,  Hardy, 
Laertius,  Plato,  418-420.  Man's  capacity 
for  affection  toward  God  and  maiikind 
recognized,  89.  Christian  conception  of 
the  future  life  of  man,  90,  91,  93,  94 ; 
noies^  Stanley,  Taylor,  429,  430.  Views 
of  the  future  hfe  held  under  other  systems, 
see  Future  Life.  Man  and  the  evan- 
gelical doctrines,  94.  His  sin,  and 
Christianity,  95,  96  ;  Martineau  quoted, 
and  Carlyle  430.  Effect  of  the  new 
conception  of  man  introduced  by 
Christianity,  96-98 ;  Villemain  quoted, 
431.  His  immortality,  99.  Views  of 
immortality  held  by  the  ancients  and  by 
modem  sceptics,  99 ;  notes ^  431-^133. 
Man's  duty-  toward  God  in  worship. 
Lecture  IV.,  103-132;  notes,  434-458. 
His  duty  to  man  in  politics  and  society, 
Lecture  V.,  135-169;  notes,  459-497. 
Effect  of  Christianity  on  his  mental 
culture.  Lecture  VII.,  211-245 ;  notes, 
527-566.  Effect  of  Christianity  on  his 
moral  hfe.  Lecture  VIII.,  249-282 ;  notes, 
567-597.  Effect  of  Christianity  on  the 
hope  of  progress,  Lecture  IX.,  285-316; 
notes,  598-624. 

Manilius,  expelled  from  the  senate  for 
kissing  his  wife  in  the  daytime,  470. 

Manilius  Antiochus,  the  founder  of 
Astronomy,  482. 

Marat,  430. 

Marcion,  361. 

Marcius,  534. 

Marcomanni,  irruption  of  the,  440. 

Marcus  Aurelius  Antoninus,  quoted  on 
Nature,  41.  His  failure  toward  giving  a 
true  knowledge  of  God,  44.  His  care  for 
children,  142.  War  under  him,  205 ; 
Gibbon  quoted,  523.  On  the  nature  of 
man,  208.  Efforts  toward  reform,  263. 
On  eternity,  302  ;  quoted,  609,  610.  On 
the  soul  after  death,  426.  On  the  slight 
value  of  life,  431,  432.  Reference  to 
him,  by  Huxley,  536.  His  reference  to 
Christianity,  586.  Renan's  "  Marc- 
Aurele "  quoted,  593,  631.  Other 
references,  161,  239,  265,  518,  584. 

Marcus  Brutus,  576. 

Marcus  Cato.    See  Cato. 

Marcus  Fulvius,  576. 

Marcus  Scaurus,  576. 

Marcy  on  the  Elsineur  exaction.s,  512.    On 

the  Declaration  of  Paris,  of  1856,  521. 
Marius,  108,  294,  442,  603. 
Marriage  and  the  position  of  Woman, 

among    the    Hebrews,    146,    147 ;    the 


Talmud  quoted,  466,  467.  In  Greece, 
148;  notes,  Plato,  Cicero,  Aristotle, 
Quarterly  Review,  Demosthenes,  Thucy- 
dides,  467,  468.  Plato  on  marriage,  85 ; 
quoted,  416,  In  China,  148,  149;  notes^ 
469.  In  Rome,  149-151 ;  notes,  470-474. 
Divorce  in  Rome,  255,  256;  notes. 
Ortolan,  Seneca,  Juvenal,  Martial,  Trop« 
long,  Plutarch,  Strabo,  Tacitus,  570-572. 
Change  of  woman's  position  undei 
Christianity,  151- 154;  notes,  475-477- 

Marsiglio  Ficino,  his  reference  to  Socrates, 
58. 

Martial,  152,  255,  475,  476,  482,  571,  578. 

Martin,  510. 

Martineau,  his  "Miscellanies,"  and 
♦'Studies  of  Christianity"  quoted;  on 
the  perception  of  truth,  369.  On 
,  Christianity,  378.  On  Gibbon,  383.  On 
God,  408.  The  dignity  of  man,  430. 
On  woman,  under  Christianity,  477.  On 
slavery,  492,  On  war,  519.  On  St.  Paul, 
540.  On  the  Christian  scriptures,  566. 
On  the  immorality  of  the  ancients,  573. 
On  Christ,  638. 

Martyrdom  and  persecution  of  Christians, 
and  the  effect,  274-278 ;  303-305 ;  notes, 
591-596;  6ti,  612.  Hymns  of  praise 
sung  by  martyrs  during  their  tortures, 
notes,  Eusebius,  Augustine,  448.  Chris- 
tians warned  against  seeking  persecution, 
277 ;  notes,  CjT^rian,  Commodianus, 
Clement,  595,  596.  The  liberation  of 
slaves,  on  the  same  level  of  privilege  with 
the  rescue  of  martyrs,  by  the  Church  in 
the  third  century,  161.  Perpetua,  275, 
304;  FeUcitas,  276;  the  "Passion  of 
Perpetua  and  Felicitas"  quoted,  594,  611. 
Blandina,  275 ;  notes,  Eusebius,  Renan, 
593.  Potamisena,  275 ;  Eusebius  quoted, 
593.  The  deaconesses  of  Lyon.;  and 
Carthage,  477.  Ignatius,  275 ;  quoted, 
592,  594.  Polycarp,  275,  593.  Sanctis, 
595.  Fabian,  612.  The  persecutions  by 
Galerius,  613,  548.  Tacitus  quoted,  57S. 
The  Christian  martyr  and  missionary 
teacher,  and  the  law  of  self-sacrifice,  114. 
Parkman  quoted,  444. 

Mass,  the,  109 ;  Canons  of  the  Council  ol 

Trent  quoted,  442. 
Mater,  Coulanges  quoted,  405. 
Materialism,  99,    Christlieb  quoted,  432, 

See  Infidelity. 
Matilda,  153. 
Matins,  and  other  hours  of  prayer,  Palmer 

quoted,  453. 
Maurice  quoted,  r4.    His   "  Religions  of 

the  World  "  quoted,  368,  378,  414. 
Maxentius,  108,  305. 
Maxims  and  precepts  common  to  Christi* 

anity  and  to  other  reUgions,  331,  332  ;  86^ 

87  ;  notes,    626,  627,  419,  420.      Chris 


^60 


INDEX. 


tianity  and  its  maxims  of  justice  and  hu- 
manity, 206,  207 ;  Ward  quoted,  526. 
Maxims  of  Aristotle,  Seneca,  and  Cicero, 
166,  167  ;  Aristotle  quoted,  494,  495. 
Fore-gleams  of  the  transcendent  light,  55  ; 
notes^  402,  403.  Adumbrations,  going 
before,  of  the  Light,  334,  335  ;  notcSy 
Jones  quoted,  628,  629, 

Maximus,  472. 

Maximus  Madaurensis,  391. 

Mazarine  Bible.    See  Gutenberg. 

Mec^nas,  479. 

Mecenius  kills  his  wife  for  tasting  wine, 
474. 

Megasthenes,  quoted  by  Muller,  469. 

Melampodes,  534. 

Memmius,  387. 

Memnon,  399. 

Mendel,  the  Jewish  name  of  Neander.  See 
Neander. 

Meng-tse,  531. 

Mental  culture  of  mankind,  the  effect  of 
Christianity  on  ;  Lecture  VIL,  211-245 ; 
noteSy  527-566. 

Menu.    See  Sacred  Books. 

Menzies,  "Turkey,  Old  and  New,"  quo- 
ted, 500. 

Mercury,  578. 

Merivale,  his  "  Romans  under  the  Em- 
pire "quoted,  395,  557,  563,  573,  577,  605. 
His  Boyle  lectures,  592. 

Messalina,  573. 

Messiah,  and  the  Messianic  doctrine,  298, 
299  ;  Strauss  quoted,  607.  The  Messianic 
predictions,  23.  The  Jew  and  a  secular 
Messiah,  340  ;  the  view  of  Philo,  Domer 
quoted,  631.  Newman  on  the  Jewish  idea 
of  a  Messiah,  418. 

Metellus  on  marriage,  470. 

Metempsychosis,  289,  290 ;  notes^  Whit- 
ney, Herodotus,  DoUinger,  599,  600. 

MiCHELET,  "  Histoire  de  France"  quoted, 
455,  620. 

Middle  Ages  ;  woman  during  the  middle 
ages  under  Christianity,  153 ;  Ozanam 
and  Martineau  quoted,  477.  The  Church 
and  the  poor,  167 ;  Norton,  Voltaire, 
Montalembert,  Lecky,  495,  496.  Arrest 
of  progress  during  the  period  immediately 
following  the  fall  of  the  Western  Empire, 
182,  183;  Bryce  and  Hodgkin  quoted, 
505.  Art  and  poetry  and  the  true  Re- 
naissance, 233  ;  notes^  552,  553.  Historical 
works  and  ling^iistic  studies  of  the  middle 
ages,  237,  239 ;  notes,  Gibbon,  Bede, 
Guizot,"  Histoire  Litteraire  de  la  France," 
558,  559.  Education,  241,  242  ;  7wies, 
Brace,  Guizot,  Remusat,  561,  562,  Mis- 
sions, 305-307 ;  7iotes,  617-619.  The 
transient  failure   of   Christianity   at  the 


close  of  the  tenth  century,  and  its  subs© 
quent  revival,  309-311 ;  Micbelet  quoted, 
620. 

Middle-class  training  and  development, 
under  Christianity,  223,  224  ;  the  contrast 
under  ancient  ethnic  religions,  224; 
Mommsen  quoted,  537. 

Miletus,  393. 

Mill,  J.  S.,  quoted,  99, 433  ;  166,  377,  399, 
538,  597. 

Millennium  and  chiHastic  speculations, 
301,  302  ;  notes,  60S,  609. 

Miltiades,  393,  500. 

Milton,  131,  303.  His  vision  of  the  Chris- 
tian commonwealth,  207.  Quoted, 
235.  On  music,  449,  On  war,  519. 
Lessing  on   '  Paradise  Lost,"  553. 

MiNUCius  Felix  quoted,  256  269,  387,  435, 
443,  455,  460,  572,  586. 

Miracles,  20-:^  ;  notes,  De  Stael,  Origen 
Locke,  Pascal,  Coleridge,  Goethe,  Chan- 
ning,  Taylor,  370, 371.  Miracles  and  the 
Christian  conception  of  God,  49.  The 
power  of  God  seen  in  the  miracles  by 
those  who  accept  Christ,  59.  The  argu- 
ment from  miracles,  prominent  and  ener- 
getic now,  350,  Miracles,  idioms  of 
Divine  utterance,  to  Christians,  354. 
Bossuet  and  Perrone  quoted,  368,  Gibbon 
on  miracles,  20.  Hume  referred  to,  565. 
Lecky  quoted  on  fairy  tales  and  miracles, 
30, 380.  Apollonius  represented  as  work- 
ing miracles,  535. 

Miriam,  147. 

MisHNA.    See  Sacred  Books. 

Missions,  Christian,  and  missionaries ;  the 
conviction,  under  Christianity,  of  its 
triumph,  and  of  a  hope  of  progress  for 
the  human  race,  the  inspiration  of  mis- 
sionary enterprise,  306-308 ;  notes,  617- 
619.  Early  missions  to  America,  114 ; 
Parkman  quoted,  444.  The  fathers, 
Dutch,  English,  Huguenot,  of  this 
country,  312,  313  ;  Bradford  quoted,  621. 
Philanthropical  effort  based  on  the  same 
missionary  inspiration,  313,  98.  Mis- 
sionary labors  and  studies,  243,  315 ; 
Muller  quoted,  564  ;  Liddon  quoted,  622. 

Mitford,  329. 

Moehler,  238. 

Moffat,  564. 

Mohammedanism  largely  indebted  to  He- 
brew and  Christian  sources,  51.  Koran 
conception  of  God,  52.  The  rehgion 
characterized,  87.  The  Koran,  or  Qurdn, 
218  ;  described  by  Sell,  533.  Translated 
into  Latin  and  refuted  by  Peter  the  Vener- 
able, 559.  The  sword  the  main  support 
of  the  religion  in  its  origin  and  successes, 
Mackenzie  quoted,  557.  Not  extended 
beyond  its  original  frontiers,  622.  Pascal 
on  Mahomet,  616. 

Mohnike,  458. 


INDEX. 


661 


MOLESCHOTT,  432. 

MOMMSEN,  "History  of  Rome"  quoted, 
470,  537,  569,  575,  633- 

Monks,  monasteries  ;  the  offices,  by  monks, 
of  faith,  charity  and  labor,  167  ;  notes, 
Norton,  Voltaire,  Montalembert,  Lecky, 
495-497.  Their  service  to  music,  117, 
118 ;  notes,  446,  447.  Their  study  and 
preservation  of  good  learning,  231,  232 ; 
notes,  544-550.  Monkish  historians, 
Gibbon  quoted,  558.  Linguistic  studies, 
558,  559.  Their  work  for  education,  241 ; 
notes,  561,  562.  The  dangers  of  the 
monasteries,  and  the  struggle  to  maintain 
them,  Ingulphus  quoted,  562,  563. 
Monkish  missions,  306-308 ;  notes,  617- 
619.  See  references  to  JAMESON,  Mon- 
talembert. 

MONNICA,  153,  489. 

Monogamy  in  the  Christian  church,  152; 
notes,  475,  476. 

Monotheism  in  ancient  religions,  41; 
notes,  Dolhnger,  Renouf,  Muller,  Cud- 
worth,  390,  391.  Under  Christianity,  48  ; 
notes,  Hedge,  Muller,  Parker,  400.  In 
ancient  mythologies  57 ;  notes  on  the 
word  Father,  404,  405 

Montalembert,  "  Monks  of  the  West  " 
quoted,  308,  446,490,  496,  617,  618,  619. 

Montaigne,  on  Christianity,  508. 

Montanism,  130,  301. 

Montesquieu,  on  the  Law  of  Nations,  510. 

Monuments  of  Egypt,  290. 

Moral  codes.  See  Maxims  and  precepts. 

Moral  development  and  civilization,  under 
Christianity,  206  ;  Ward  quoted,  526. 

Moral  intuitions,  334. 

Moral  Law,  The,  82.  Kant  quoted,  416, 
420.    Schaff  quoted,  416. 

Moral  life  of  Antiquity.  See  Heathen- 
ism. 

Moral  life  of  mankind,  the  effect  of  Chris- 
tianity on  ;  Lecture  VIIL,  249-282  ;  notes, 
567-597- 

Moral  truth,  condition  of  its  acceptance, 
18,  19 ;  notes,  Martineau,  Pascal,  369. 

Mores  Catholici,  by  Digby,  quoted,  591. 

Moriah,  123,  351. 

Mosaic  of  Christ  on  the  Cselian,  168. 
Mosaics  in  Ravenna,  233  ;  Hodgkin  quo- 
ted, 552, 

Mosaic  system.    See  Moses. 

Moses  ;  prophecies  of,  and  institutes,  23 ; 
Schleiermacher  quoted,  373.  The  Pen- 
tateuch, 221 ;  reference  to,  by  Sell,  533. 
The  Mosaic  system  and  Christianity,  337, 
338 ;  notes,  630,  631.  Law  of  Moses, 
340,  341.  Plato  on  Moses,  Justin  Martyr 
quoted,  388,  544.  Parker  on  Moses,  400. 
See  Hebrews. 


Mosheim,  535. 

Moslem.    See  Mohammedanism. 

Motley,  524. 

Mucius,  578. 

Muller  quoted;  "Science  of  Religion,* 

57,    80,    217,    237,    381,    404,  429,  637. 

"  Chips  from  a  German  Workshop,"  362, 

364,  378,  400,  413,  414,  437,  529,  530,  533i 
564.  "History  of  Ancient  Sanskrit 
Literature, "  390, 457,  469.  His  translation 
of  the  Dhammapada,  627. 

Muratori,  492. 

Murray  ;  "  Lectures  on  Psalms  "  quoted, 

466. 

Music  in  ancient  times  and  under  Chris- 
tianity, 115-118;  notes,  444-449.  The 
Temple  worship  at  Jerusalem,  Murray 
quoted,  466. 

Muslims.    See  Mohammedanism. 

MusoNius,  610. 

Mysteries,  Eleusinian,  42  ;  DoUinger  quo- 
ted, 392,  585.     Uhlhorn  quoted,  392. 

Mythes  ;  mists  of  alleged  Divine  converse 
with  men,  8  ;  Niebuhr  and  Grote  quoted, 

365,  366. 

Nabis,  399. 

N^vius,  his  metrical  Annals,  the  oldest 

Roman     historical     work ;      Mommsen 

quoted,  633, 

Naoroji,  quoted  by  Miiller,  533. 
Nation,  the,  a  Divine  institution,  189. 
Nations,  new  conception  of  the  duties  of, 

toward  each  other.  Lecture  VL,  173-208; 

notes,  498-526. 
Neale  :  "  Essays  on  Liturgiology  "  quoted, 

453,  624. 
Neander,   his  character  and  work,   238. 

Changes  his  name  from  Mendel,    338. 

"  History  of  the  Church  "  quoted,  41,  58, 

206,     302,     304,     307,     535,     625,     635. 

"Derheilige  Bemhard,"  506.     "  Life  of 

Christ,"  607. 
Necessity,   Pagan  or   Stoical,    85,    302. 

Seneca  on  Fate,  387,  417 ;  Marcus  Aurelius 

and    Polybius    quoted,    609,    610.      Sea 

Fate,  Nemesis. 
Nemesis,  288 ;  notes,  DoUinger,  Symonds, 

598. 
Nero,  39,  43,  187,  188,  257,  258,  259,  261, 

262,  265,  281,  486,  572,  575, 578,  580,  605. 
Netherlands  and  Belgium,  separated  by 

treaty,  in  1831,  193 ;  note,  511 ;  Wheaton 

referred  to,  512. 
Nevers,  499. 
New  conception  of  God,  introduced  by 

Christianity,  35-63  ;  notes,  381-408.     Of 

man,    67-99 ;    notes,    409-433.     Of   the 

duty  of  man  toward  God  in  worship, 

T03-132 ;  notes,  434-458.     Of  man's  dut^ 


662 


INDEX. 


to  man,  in  politics  and  society,  135-169  ; 
notes,  459-497.  Of  the  duties  of  nations 
toward  each  other,  173-208 ;  notes, 
498-526. 

Newman,  F.,  his  •'  Phases  of  Faith"  quo- 
ted, 407. 

Newman,  Cardinal,  quoted ;  on  Dogma 
and  argfumentative  proof,  15, 368 ;  quoted, 
301.  On  preaching,  418.  On  music, 
448.  On  Cicero,  487.  Structure  and  style 
of  scripture,  538.  On  Christianity,  543. 
Labors  of  the  monks  in  the  preservation 
of  good  learning,  549. 

New  Testament  Scriptures  and  Chris- 
tianity, 4.  Compared  with  the  Sacred 
books  of  other  religions,  24,  25  ;  notes, 
375-378. 

Newton,  376. 

Nibelungen-Lied,  68. 

NrcENE  Creed,  119,  120. 

Nicias,  483,  484,  498. 

Nicolas  V.,  495. 

Niebuhr:  Lectures  on  Roman  history 
quoted,  498.  History  of  Rome,  365,  534. 
Reference  to,  526. 

Nightingale,  Miss,  204. 

Nigidius,  139,  460. 

NiMiROF,  Congress  at,  where  International 
Law  was  first  invoked  for  protection  by 
the  Turks,  515. 

Nirvana,  92 ;  notes,  Renouf,  Davids, 
Mullor,  428.  References  to,  76 ;  Muller, 
413 ;  Barth,  530. 

NONNA,  153. 

NoRBERT,   328 ;  accounts  of,  by  Neander 

and  Jameson,  625. 
Norm  of  the  Aryan  household,  148. 
NoRTHCOTE  and  Brownlow.     See  Rossi. 
Norton:  "Studies  of  Church  Building" 

quoted,  495. 

Notes  to  Lectures,  361-639. 
Notre  Dame  de  Paris,  562. 
Numa,  60 ;  Divine  instruction  of,  Niebuhr 
quoted,  365.     Plutarch,  383. 

Obliteration  from  the  knowledge  of 
mankmd  of  places  historically  identifjed 
with  the  hfe  of  Christ  on  earth,  124,  125  ; 
Renan  quoted,  455. 

OCTACILIUS  Pilitus,  485. 

Octavius,  139,  269,  394,  460,  569,  572. 

CEdipus,  140,  288,  403. 

Oldenburg  on  Buddha,  quoted,  413. 

Olympiodorus,  468. 

Olympus,  289. 

Olympus  the  flute  player,  445. 

Omens,  auguries,  portents,  294-296 ;  notes, 
6o3-6c»6,     Reference  to,  309. 


Onkelos,  author  of  the  Targum,  639. 

CORT  and  Hooykaas  :  "  Bible  for  Learners* 
quoted,  216. 

Oracle  of  Trophonius,  127 ;  notes ^ 
Pausanius,  Mahaffy,  456.  Of  Delphi| 
292;  Cicero  quoted,  601.  Ammon, 
Strabo  quoted,  602,  Dodona,  404.  Cicerc 
on  oracles  and  predictions,  372.  Porphyr> 
on  oracles,  219 ;  note,  535.     See  Omens. 

Oratory,  religious  eloquence  under  Chris- 
tianity, 236 ;  notes.  Gibbon,  Mackenzie, 
Apostol.  Const.,  Bade,  Merivale,  556, 
557.    See  Preaching. 

Ordericus  Vitalis  quoted,  618. 

Organ,  The,  in  worship,  117 ;  Montalem- 
bert  quoted,  446 ;  Milton,  449, 

Origen,  reference  to,  231,  314,  457,  528. 
On  miracles,  370.  On  Christ,  388.  Chris- 
tianity, 434,  489,  527.  Infant  baptism, 
465.  On  Scripture,  536.  On  the  finaJ 
victory  of  the  Gospel,  301,  304  ;  quoted, 
608,  612,  613.  On  Aristotle,  401. 
On  Plato,  545.  Account  by  Gregory 
Thaumat.  of  Origen's  addresses  on 
philosophy,  546. 

Orkney  islands,  mission  to,  308  ;  notes  on 
Columba,  619. 

Orpheus,  233,  274,  592. 

Orphic  writings,  218 ;  notes,  534. 

Ortolan:  "History  of  Roman  Law" 
quoted,  459,  462,  470,  570. 

Osiris,  531. 

OsMAN  Pasha,  176. 

Otto,  306. 

Ovid,  39,  261,  384,.  474,  549,  572,  581. 

Oxford  University,  its  origfin,  242. 

OZANAM :  "  Civilization  in  the  Fifth 
Century"  quoted,  395,  477,  485,  504, 
560,  590. 


PiETUS,  and  his  wife  Arria,   263 ;    Pliny 

quoted,  472. 
Pagan  religions,  remains  of,  at  the  present 

day,    Renan  quoted,  504.     See  ETHNIC 

Religions,  Heathenism. 
Palatine  graphite,  its  supposed  reference 

to  Christ,   104.     Reference  to    Lundy's 

"  Monumental  Christianity,"  435. 

Palatine  Hill,  187 ;  the  Hut  of  Romulus, 

252  ;  notes.  Bum  quoted,  567. 
Palingenesia,  The,  of  a  moribund  world, 

341. 
Palmer:    "Origines  Liturgicne"  quoted 

452,  453- 
Palmerius,  498. 

Pammachius,  hospital  built  by  him,  591. 
Pandects,   Institutes  and  the   Codex   01 

Justinian  translated  into  Greek,  344. 
Pantheism,  39,  40 ;  Pliny  referred  to,  40 


INDEX, 


663 


notesy  Pliny,  Aug^ustine,  Lucretius, 
Minucius  Felix,  Seneca,  386,  387. 
Tendency  to,  always  active,  46 ;  notesy 
Parker,  Virgil,  Zeller,  the  UpanishadSy 
Duncker,  397,  398.  Stoicism  and  pan- 
theism, 344 ;  Uebervveg  quoted,  633,  634. 
Pantheistic  conception  of  human  souls, 
58. 

Papacy,  The,  in  the  Middle  Ages,  309. 
Development  of  secular  law  among 
nations  delayed  by  it,  185;  Bluntschli 
quoted,  506 ;  reference  to,  323. 

PAriNIAN,  238. 

Paris,  Treaty  of,  1856,  203;  Wheaton 
quoted,  521.  University  of  Paris,  242. 
"Abelard,"  by  Remusat,  quoted,  562. 
Council  of,  in  824,  561. 

Parker:  ♦'  Discourse  of  Religion"  quoted, 
365,  376,  397,  400,  420,  449,  493,  502,  537, 
583,  597.  622,  638. 

Parkman  quoted,  444. 

Parousia,  The,  300. 

Parsees,  or  Parsis;  in  India  and  Persia, 
religion  of,  218 ;  their  scriptures  and 
priests,  Duncker,  Haug,  and  Muller  quo- 
ted 532,  533.  Zoroaster  and  the  Avesta, 
Muller  and  Haug  quoted,  364,  365.  The 
Parsi  doctrine  of  God,  DoUinger  and 
Haug  quoted,  398.  Quotation  from  the 
Avesta,  80,  414.  Sosiosh,  291 ;  account 
of,  by  Hardwick,  600.  Zoroaster  and  the 
care  of  animals,  Duncker  quoted,  436. 
Reference  to  the  Zoroastrian  ceremonial, 
by  Haug,  437 ;  and  to  Zoroaster,  by 
Stanley,  542.    See  Persia. 

Parthian  power,  The,  290,  291 ;  Parthian 
Kings,  523. 

Pascal,  Pensees  quoted,  21,  45,  237,  369, 
370,  374,  404,  430.  539,  558,  6i6. 

Paschal  season,  and  joyous  (Alleluia) 
services,  Neale  quoted,  452. 

Paschasius  Radbert,  549. 

Pasherenptah,  428. 

Passion  of  Perpetua.    See  Perpetua. 

P ATI  ENS,  Bishop,  verses  on  Church  at  Lyons 
quoted,  552. 

Pater.    See  Father. 

Paul,  Saint.  See  Gospels  and  Epistles. 

Paul,  the  Hermit ;  Kingsley :  "  The  Her- 
mits "  quoted,  583 

Paula,  449 

Paullus,  156,  238,  480. 

Pausanius:  •♦Description  of  Greece" 
referred  to,  or  quoted,  127,  292,  401,  402, 
439,  456,  500,  602. 

Peace  universal,  vision  of,  Milton  quoted, 
207  ;  notes  on  the  scheme  of  Henry  IV., 
and  synopsis  of  other  plans,  525,  526. 
Lessing  on  enthusiasts,  and  Ward  on 
maxims  of  Humanity  and  Justice,  526. 
Tendency  to  the  establishment  of  Courts 


of  Arbitration,  323.  Peace,  the  object  ol 
War,  201;  noteSy  Augustine  and  others, 
518,  519.  Lieber  on  the  object  of  war, 
521. 

Peace  offering,  Hebrew  significance  of, 
107.  Greek  idea  of,  DolSnger  quoted, 
436. 

Pedanius  Secundus,  486. 

Peiresc,  509. 

Peisistratus,  30,  393,  460. 

Pentateuch.    See  Moses. 

Perception  of  spiritual  truth,  ig;  Mar 
tineau  and  Pascal  quoted,  369.  Argumen- 
tative proof,  and  dogma,  15  ;  noteSy  New- 
man, Bossuet,  Augustine,  Perrone,  368. 

Pericles,  91,  148,  164,  468,  560. 

Perpetua,  275,  276,  304 ;  "  The  Passion 
of  Perpetua  and  Fehcitas "  quoted,  594, 
611. 

Perrone  :  "  Praelectiones  Theologica  " 
quoted,  368. 

Persecutions.    See  Martyrdom. 

Persia,  repulse  of  its  army  at  Marathoi; 
ascribed  to  the  prayers  of  courtesans  to 
Venus,  38  ;  Athenaeus  quoted,  383.  Treat- 
ment of  its  heralds,  176  ;  Herodotus  quo- 
ted, 500.  Collapse  of,  and  expected  com- 
ing of  Sosiosh,  290,  291 ;  Hardwick  quo- 
ted, 600.  Persian  Magi  referred  to  by 
Cicero,  454.  Persians  referred  to  by  the 
Greeks  as  barbarians,  499,  502.  See 
Parsees,  religion  of. 

Personality,  Christian,  and  the  sacred- 
ness  of  the  state  as  a  Divine  institute,  186, 
187. 

Personality  of  God,  Christian  conception 
of,  46.  Its  relation  to  the  soul  of  man,  58. 
See  Fatherhood  of  God,  and  Father. 

Peru  and  Japan  submit  to  arbitration,  2o5. 

Pessimism,  philosophic,  99 ;  notes,  Christ- 
lieb,  Reade,  Strauss,  Mill,  432,  433. 
Scepticism  uniformly  pessimistic,  315 ; 
Reade  quoted,  623.  Infidel  view  of  Chris- 
tianity, Reade  and  Wise  quoted,  632. 
See  Infidelity. 

Peter,  Saint.    See  Gospels  and  Epistles. 

Peter  Damiani,  119. 

Peter  Lombard,  242. 

Peter  the  Venerable,  153,  549  j  causes  the 
Koran  to  be  translated,  that  it  might  ba 
refuted,  559. 

Petronian  Law  and  slavery,  161.    Troi> 

long  quoted,  488. 
Petrus  Cellensis,  549. 

PHiEDON,  156. 

Pheidias,  292. 

Philanthropy.    See  BenevoiencEv 

Philemonides,  483. 

Philip,  180,  610. 


064 


INDEX. 


Phii  limore  :  Com.  on  International  Law 
quoted,  i8o,  511,  His  translation  of 
Lessing's  "  Laocoon"  quoted,  553. 

PuiLO,  his  system,  339,  340 ;  Dorner  quo- 
ted, 631. 

Philosophy,  Christian ;  the  relation  of 
God  to  the  soul  of  man,  58  ;  Bunsen  quo- 
ted, 443.  Development  of,  62,  231,  232  ; 
7ioies,  544-549.  Its  stimulating  power 
upon  the  higher  intellectual  nature,  235- 
236 ;  notes,  Coleridge,  Pierce,  555  ;  notes 
on  Shakespeare,  and  Edwards,  556. 
Seneca's  definition  and  the  comment  of 
Lactantius,  568.  Clement  on  philosophy, 
610,  611.  Recognition  of  God  in  it,  285, 
286.  Its  effect  in  early  times  in  amelio- 
rating slaveiy,  161  ;  Troplong  quoted, 
488.  Philosophy  in  ancient  Greece  and 
Rome,  251-254  ;  notes,  567,  568.  Impo- 
tent against  immorality,  262,  263  ;  notes, 
Arnold  quoted,  263,  582.  Absence  of  a 
positive  recognition  of  God,  and  of  a  clear 
outlook  and  hope  for  the  race,  286-206  ; 
notes,  598-606.  Man  in  Greek  philosophy, 
74;  notes,  Plato,  Aristotle,  Tacitus,  411. 
The  future  life  for  man  in  Greek  and 
Roman  philosophy,  91,  92  ;  notes,  421- 
426.  Its  appeal  only  to  the  educated  and 
high  born,  306.  Points  of  support,  in  the 
Platonic  and  Stoical  philosophies,  to  the 
religion  of  Jesus,  344,  345 ;  Ueberweg 
and  Justin  Martyr  quoted,  633,  634.  See 
also.  Epicureans,  Philo,  Stoical 
School,  Animism,  Pessimism,  Panthe- 
ism, Brahmanic  System,  Buddhism, 
and  under  names  of  Greek  and  Roman 
philosophers. 

Philostratus,  his  life  of  Apollonius  of 
Tyana,  219;  notes,  535. 

Phokylides,  473. 
Phryne,  383,  396. 
Phylarchus,  148. 

Physical  nature,  study  of,  under  Chris- 
tianity, 235,  236 ;  notes,  Coleridge,  Pierce, 

555- 
Pictor,  633. 

PiCTS,  mission  to,  308  ;  notes  on  Columba, 

618,  619. 
Picture  of  the  moral  life  of  Antiquity  at 

the  time  Christianity  appeared,  249-263  ; 

n}tes,  567-582. 
Pierce,   his  *'  Ideality    in    the    Physical 

Sciences  "quoted,  555. 
Pierre  of  Poitiers,  559. 
Pierrk  of  Toledo,  559. 
Pilgrim  Fathers  of  the  United  States,  321  ; 

notes,  Bancroft,  Bradford,  621. 
Pilgrim's  hospital  at  Rome,  591. 
Pindar,  54,  72,  382,  402,  444.     Pausanius 

quoted,  402. 
Pindenissus,  pillaged  and  its  inhabitants 

enslaved,  156;  Livy  and  Cicero  quoted, 

480. 


Piracy  encouraged  by  the  Greeks  foi  th« 
benefit  of  the  slave  traffic,  156,  157  ;  notes, 
479- 

Pittacus,  628. 

Pity,  altar  to,  in  Athens,  52 ;  without 
worshipper  or  priest,  272 ;  Pausanius 
quoted,  401.  Stoical  view  of  pity,  Seneca 
quoted,  272,  588. 

Pius  V.,  495. 

Placidia,  552. 

Plancus,  discovery  of  the  Foraminifera, 
Hart  wig  quoted,  404. 

Plan'T  worship,  72 ;  Whitney  quoted,  410. 

Plantia  Urgulanilla,  459. 

Plato  ;  his  conception  of  a  Creator,  40 ; 
quoted,  388,  with  comment  by  Origen. 
Conception  of  the  universe,  50,  On  the 
Gods,  55 ;  quoted,  .^02  The  daimon 
within  of  the  Platonic  Socrates,  58  ;  quo- 
ted, 406,  and  note  by  DuUinger.  Waiting 
f or  a  celes*  ial  teacher,  60;  quoted,  406. 
On  the  origin  of  the  human  race,  71 ; 
quoted,  410.  He  addresses  only  the 
cultured,  74;  quoted,  411.  On  the 
Hellenic  race,  77 ;  quoted,  413.  Great 
poets  inspired  and  possessed,  80  ;  quoted, 
414.  The  individual  subject  in  all  matters 
to  the  commonwealth,  85;  quoted,  416 
On  a  future  life,  91 ;  quoted,  421, 
Children  should  be  trained  under  public 
officers,  140 ;  quoted,  461.  Wives  and 
children  to  be  in  common,  148  ;  quoted, 
467.  On  the  regulation  of  women,  150  ; 
quoted,  473.  On  slaves,  157 ;  quoted, 
482.  On  the  treatment  of  the  poor,  164  ; 
quoted,  494.  On  Hellenes  and  bar- 
barians, 502.  On  the  isolation  of  states, 
518.  On  Justice,  254.  On  philosophy 
and  the  State,  584.  No  hope  of  progress, 
302.  Incidental  references,  47,  68,  105, 
188,  2T4,  3;;3,  376,  399,  418,  462,  468,  559. 
Justin  Martyr  on  Plato;  attributes  a 
Divine  inspiration  to  his  philosophy,  232  ; 
quoted,  544.  Lifted  out  of  his  study  of 
Plato,  by  the  persecutions  of  the 
Christians,  278 ;  quoted,  596.  On  the 
teachings  of  Plato,  303 ;  quoted,  610. 
Effects,  and  End  of  Plato's  philosophy, 
345  ;  quoted,  634. 

Augustine  and  Tertullian  on  Plato, 
232  ;  quoted,  547.  Origen  on  Plato,  388, 
536,  546.  Gieseler  on  Platonism  and  its 
agreement  with  Christianity,  548.  Zeller 
quoted  on  the  pantheism  of  Plato,  397. 
On  his  sale  in  the  slave-market,  and  his 
ransom ;  Zeller  and  others  quoted,  479, 
and  reference  to,  156.  References  to 
Plato  by  Phirimore,  511  ;  by  Stanley, 
542 ;  by  DoUinger,  on  Plato  and  the 
Eleusinia,  5S6. 

Plautius,  591. 

Plautus,  on  the  treatment  of  strangers, 
quoted,  164,  and  in  the  original,  493, 
Reference  to  his  plays,  257.  His  use  ol 
the  term  literatus,  485. 


INDEX. 


665 


pLEROMA,   The,  338.     See  Gnosticism, 

ZOE. 

Pliny,  doubts  the  existence  of  God,  40 ; 
quoted,  386.  Csesar's  magical  formula, 
54 ;  quoted,  402.  No  belief  in  a  future 
Ufe,  91 ;  quoted,  424.  On  slaves,  480, 
482,  485.  On  divination  and  the  Sibylline 
books,  534.  On  Poppaea's  milk  baths, 
257 ;  quoted,  575.  Arts  and  vice  in 
Rome,  261.  Incidental  references,  258, 
441.  474,  577. 

Pliny,  the  younger,  on  the  Christians,  104 ; 
quoted,  434,  586.  His  reference  to  the 
Gloria  in  Excelsis,  119;  quoted,  450. 
Accounts  of  several  noble  women,  150 ; 
quoted,  472.  His  action  in  regard  to  free- 
bom  and  slave  children,  142 ;  quoted,  463. 
On  the  accompaniments  of  ancient  feasts, 
570.     Incidental  references,  492,  560,  605. 

Plotinus,  41,  62,  74. 

Plutarch,  on  the  universality  of  worship, 
381.  No  images  of  deities  in  Rome 
under  Numa,  383.  On  atheism,  45 ; 
ciuoted,  397.  On  a  future  life,  426.  On 
Jiuman  sacrifices,  108 ;  quoted,  439,  440, 
441,  442.  Only  strong  children  reared  in 
Sparta,  461.  On  slaves,  480,  483,  484, 
485.  Statues  erected  to  the  memory  of 
great  poets,  527.  Cato  denounces  Greek 
philosophy  and  oratory,  241,  561.  Virtue 
the  health  of  the  soul,  254 ;  quoted,  568. 
Fortune  of  the  Romans,  601.  Omens  in 
the  time  of  Marius,  294 ;  quoted,  603. 
On  Alexander,  342 ;  quoted,  632,  502. 
Incidental  references,  44,  55,  157,  256  271, 
418,  470,  567,  568,  S7I,  572,  578. 

Pluto,  425,  470. 

Poetry  and  poets.  The  poet,  57.  Poetry 
and  consciousness,  68.  Plato  on  poets, 
80 ;  quoted,  414.  Poets,  in  Plato's 
commonwealth,  to  conform  their  com- 
positions to  the  laws,  85 ;  Plato's  Laws 
quoted,  417.  The  poet  of  the  ancient 
epic,  Grote  and  Curtius  quoted,  415. 
Epic  and  idylic  beauty  of  the  Book  of 
Ruth,  Goethe  quoted,  235.  Poetry  of  the 
sentiments,  Schiller  quoted  by  Humboldt, 
554i  555'  Poets,  prophets  and  psalmists, 
226 ;  notes,  Goethe,  Stanley,  Ewald, 
541-543.  Poetry  of  domestic  life, 
Euripides  quoted,  587.  Wordsworth,  to 
H.  C.  quoted,  139.  Arnold's  verses  on 
Pagan  Rome  quoted,  582;  referred  to, 
263.  Verses  on  the  fall  of  Pagan  Rome, 
by  Mrs.  C.  F.  Alexander,  quoted,  614, 
615. 

Poland,  partition  of,  512.  Treatment  of 
French  Ambassadors  to  Poland  in  i66o, 
514. 

Political  philosophy  in  Pagan  times, 
Polybius  quoted,  610.    See  Polybius. 

POLLIO,  of  Virgil's  fourth  Eclogue,  316; 
Neale  quoted,  624.  Reference  to,  291 ; 
Virgil  quoted,  600. 


Polybius,  his  philosophy  of  the  usefulness 

of  religion  to  the  state,  291 ;  quoted,  601. 

Modern  parallel  to,  Voltaire  quoted,  6di. 

Polybius  on  political    philosophy,    610 

contrast  of  the  Christian  view,  Neandei 

quoted,  302.     Reference,  498. 
Polycarp,  martyrdom  of,  275 ;  account  of, 

quoted,  593.     Reference,  528. 
Polytheism,    '  42-44 ;     notes^     39^-393 

Reference  to,  211. 
POMPEY,  140,  294,  435,  485. 

POMPONIA  GRiECINA,  S9I. 
PONTIFEX,  43,  393. 

Poor,  The,  and  dependent  before  Chris* 
tianity,  164;  notes,  Plautus,  Plato,  493. 
Under  Christianity,  165-167;  notes, 
494-496.  No  systematic  benevolence  in 
ancient  Greece  and  Rome,  and  the 
contrast  under  Christianity,  272-274; 
notes,  588-591.  The  glory  and  diadem 
of  the  Christian  religion,  329. 

Pope,  The,  reference  to  him,  of  disputes 
between  princes,  182.  Humble  bhth  of 
some  pontiffs,  167 ;  Voltaire  quoted,  495, 
496.    Papal  Nuncios,  514.    See  Papacy. 

P0PP-<EA,  her  luxurious  habits,  257 ;  Pliny 
quoted,  575.  Her  daughter  made  * 
goddess,  43  ;  Tacitus  quoted,  395. 

Porphyry  on  oracles,  219 ;  note,  535. 

Porsena,  293. 

Portents,  omens,  auguries,  294-296 
notes,  603-606.     Reference  to,  309,  372. 

Poseid6n,  his  rank  and  functions,  415. 

POSIDONIUS,  476. 

Positivism,  unbelief ;  have  no  utterance  of 
music,  or  spiritual  aspiration,  118. 

POSTE,  464. 

Potami^na,  her  martyrdom,  275;  Euse- 
bius  quoted,  593. 

Power,  homage  to ;  natural  to  man,  in  the 
civilized  as  in  the  barbarian  state,  73. 

Praxiteles,  383. 

Prayer:  Christian  hope  for  the  future, 
under  Divine  providence,  the  impulse  to 
prayer,  326.  See  Liturgies,  Books  of 
Hours.  Abominable  prayers  to  the 
gods  of  the  pagans,  39 ;  Seneca  quoted, 
384.  Plato  and  Socrates  on  prayer  and 
sacrifice,  402;  reference  to,  55.  Francis 
Newman,  on  Horace  and  Cicero  in 
regard  to  prayer,  407.  The  involuntary 
prayer  of  the  Burmese  atheists,  Bigandet 
quoted,  457.  Infidel  view,  Reade  quoted, 
623. 

Preaching,  unknown  in  the  ethnic 
religions,  except  in  the  Buddhist,  86; 
notes,  Renan,  Dollinger,  418.  The  appeal 
of  Christianity,  through  preaching,  to  the 
conscience  and  to  the  intellect  of  man, 
86-89 ;  Newman  quoted,  418.  Christian 
preachers,  236 ;  notes,  Gibbon,  Mackenzie, 


CG6 


INDEX. 


Apostol.  Constitutions,  Bede,  Merivale, 

556,  557. 
Precepts.    See  Maxims. 
Predictions,     Cicero     on,     372.      See 

Prophecies. 
Pressens£:  "  Early  Years  of  Christianity  " 

quoted,  538,  551. 
Priam,  384. 
Priapus,  384,  391. 
Prichard     and     Nasmith's     edition     of 

Ortolan's  "Roman  Law"  quoted,  459, 

462,  470. 

Pride,  Sophocles  quoted,  403. 

Priests,  pag^an ;  no  edification  attempted 
by  them,  Renan  and  Dollinger  quoted, 
418 ;  reference,  86.  Attempts  to  main- 
tain their  order  and  dignity,  notes^  Sue- 
tonius, Tacitus,  602  ;  reference,  292. 

Primal  energy,  ancient  theories  of,  and  the 
Christian  conception,  50. 

Princeton  Review  quoted,  556. 

Printing,  232 ;  Humphreys  quoted,  550. 

Priscilla,  151,  551. 

Priscus,  253. 

Private  International  Law  and  Christian- 
ity, 197  ;  Foelix  and  Savigny  quoted,  516, 
517.  References  to  Savigny  :  *'  Private 
International  Law,"  380,  501,  517,  526, 
621.    See  International  Law. 

Privateering,  203 ;  Woolsey  and  Whea- 
ton  quoted,  520,  521. 

Probus,  577. 

Prodigies.    See  Portents. 

Progress,  and  final  victory  of  the  Gospel, 
302  ;  notes,  Origen,  Augustine,  608.  Pa- 
gan views  of  progress,  302 ;  Marcus 
Aurelius  and  Polybius  quoted,  609,  610. 
See  World's  hope  of  progress. 

Projet  de  Paix  perpetuelle ;  Ihe  schemes 
of  Henry  IV.  of  France,  and  others ; 
nctes,  525,  526 ;  reference,  206. 

Prometheus,  72,  288,  473,  611. 

Propertius,  475. 

Prophecies,  22,  23 ;  notes,  Justin  Martyr, 
Irenacus,  Jones,  Schleiermacher,  De 
Wette,  Stanley,  Pascal,  372-374  ;  Bossuet, 
Augustine,  Perrone,  368;  Pascal,  369. 
Christian  conception  of  man  justified  by 
prophecy  and  miracle,  99.  Bacon  on 
prophecy,  606;  reference,  298.  The 
prophet  and  the  poet,  Goethe  and  Stan- 
ley quoted,  541,  542,  The  prophetic  gift, 
Ewali  quoted,  542,  543.  Prophecies  in 
the  fc'jrth  eclogue  of  Virgil,  316  ;  Neale 
quoted,  624  ;  reference  to,  291 ;  Virgil 
quoted,  600.    See  Messiah. 

I'rophesying  fore-gleams  of  the  transcend- 
ent light,  in  Socrates,  Plato,  and  others, 
55;  notes,  Plato,  Xenophon,  Sophocles, 
iEschylus,  402,  403.      Contrast  of   the 


Christian   conception    of    God,    Pasca 

quoted,  55.  Adumbrations,  going  before, 

of    the  Light :   unconscious    prophecies, 

334.  335.    See  Maxims. 
Propitiation  for  sin.  Christian  doctrim 

of,  Taylor  quoted,  442.    See  Sacrifice 
Prosperous,  the,  hated  by  the  Gods,  288. 

See  Fate. 
Proteus,  535. 
Providence,  secularist  view  of,  Holyoake 

quoted,  70,  409. 
Prudentius,  119. 
PsALMisTiE,  Hawkins  and  Bingham  quoted, 

446. 
Psalms,  Hebrew  Praise-hymns,  u6.  Hym- 

nody,  118,  119;  notes,  447,  451. 
Psalms  of  David,  221. 
Psychology  and  Christianity,  68,  69. 
Ptolemy,  297. 
PUBLIUS,  482. 
PuBLius  Scipio,  633. 

PUDENS,  475. 

Pyrrhonism,  8,  40,  104, 
Pythagoras,  48,  55,  116,  559. 

quadratus,  274. 
Quarterly  Review  quoted,  468. 
QuiNTiLiAN's  Institutes  quoted,  393. 
Quran.    See  Koran. 


Rambaud  :   "  History  of  Russia  "  quoted, 

514- 
Raphael,  168,  245,  551. 
Rawlinson  quoted,  580. 
Reade  :    "  Martyrdom  of   Man  "  quoted, 

432,  433,  623,  632. 
Reformation,  the,  311. 
Regeneration,  88. 
Regulus,  174,  498. 

Religion  :  Claims  of  the  common  origin  of 
all  religions,  7-9 ;  notes,  Parker,  Strauss, 
365.  Meaning  and  office  of  religion,  13, 
14 ;  Lactantius  quoted,  366.  Must  con- 
sist  of  ideas  and  facts,  Coleridge  quoted, 
362.  Argumentative  proof  and  dogma, 
15 ;  Newman  quoted,  368.  Conditions 
of  the  acceptance  of  moral  truth,  18,  19; 
notes,  Martineau,  Pascal,  369.  Human 
systems  egotistic  and  sterile,  27.  Religion 
more  potentiad  with  peoples  than  with  in- 
dividuals, 28 ;  Ewald  quoted,  379.  Evi- 
dence required  by  modern  thought,  29- 
31 ;  notes,  Savigny,  and  Rowe,  3S0.  His- 
torical interest  of  ancient  religions,  36, 
37.  Anthropos,  37  ;  its  meaning.  Mullet 
quoted,  381 .  Plutarch  on  the  universality 
of  religion,  381.    "Heavenly  Father,"  a 


INDEX. 


%Q1 


flame  for  God ;  its  use,  common  to  Chris- 
tianity and  to  ethnic  religion,  and  its  di- 
verse meanings,  57  ;  notes,  Muller,  Luther, 
Coulanges,  Whitney,  Heam,  404,  405. 
See  Monotheism.  Practical  reUgion, 
Francis  Newman  quoted,  407.  Can  re- 
ligion add  to  man's  self-knowledge,  68. 
A  bond  of  union  between  men  and  nations, 
179 ;  Savigny  and  Ward  quoted,  501. 
Ancient  utilitarian  view  of  reUgion,  291 ; 
notes,  Polybius,  601 ;  Cicero,  454 ;  mod- 
em parallel  to,  Voltaire  quoted,  601. 
Plutarch  on  the  need  of  a  supreme  ruler, 
601.  Religious  idealism,  Neander  on  St. 
Augustine  quoted,  634.  Religious  liberty, 
305  ;  Tertullian  quoted,  614.  See  Chris- 
tianity, Ethnic  religions,  Philoso- 
phy. 

RfiMUSAT,  A.,  cited  by  Schlegel,  on  the 
Chinese  character  representing  woman, 
149 ;  Schlegel  quoted,  469. 

R^MUSAT,  C,  on  the  University  of  Paris, 
562. 

RENAissANCE,The,  extravagances  of,  Syra- 
onds  quoted,  369.  The  true  Renaissance, 
233 ;  notes,  Burckhardt,  Bryce,  552,  553. 

Renan  on  the  true  miracle  of  nascent 
Christianity;  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  278. 
The  ideal  of  the  religion  of  Jesus,  455. 
The  Jewish  hope  of  a  happy  future,  299, 
607.  Christianity  and  Judaism,  630,  631. 
No  edification  in  pagan  religions,  418. 
Superstitions,  504.  On  Blandina,  593. 
The  Hibbert  lectures  quoted,  142,^  168, 
259,  262,  278,  418,  504,  607,  630.  Life  of 
Jesus,  455.  Marc  Aurele,  593,  630,  631. 
Reference,  361. 

Renouf  quoted  on  the  religion  of  Ancient 
Egypt,  92,  390,  427,  428.  On  the  Egyp- 
tian Book  0/  the  Dead,  531,  532. 

Resurrection  of  Jesus,  636. 

Review  of  the  argument  with  added  sug- 
gestions, 319-357  ;  notes,  625-639. 

RiCHTER,  Carlyle's  essay  on :  maxim  quo- 
ted, 9. 

Righteousness,  a  sense  of  its  necessity, 
under  the  supremacy  of  Christianity,  326. 
The  Divine  Rule  of  righteousness  by 
Christ,  353. 

Rig-Veda.  See  Vedas,  Sacred  Books. 

Riparian  rights,  184, 

Rites  of  worship,  debasing  forms  in  an- 
cient times,  37-39 ;  notes,  382-385. 

Robert,  King,  of  France,  620, 

Robertson:  "Charles  V."  quoted,  491, 
513. 

Rochefoucauld  quoted,  195. 

Roger  de  Hautrive,  617,  6i8. 

Roger  de  Sap,  618. 

Roland,  68. 

Rome;  its  gods  and  worship  at  the  time 
Christianity  appeared,  39 ;    notes,  384, 


385,  Local  gods,  123 ;  Cicero  quoted, 
454.  Roman  atheistic  and  pantheistic 
views  of  God,  40 ;  notes,  386,  387.  De- 
cay of  faith  in  the  gods,  and  tendency  to 
human  worship,  42,  43 ;  notes,  394-396. 
This  tendency  matched  with  the  first 
teaching  of  Christianity,  73.  No  record 
of  Divine  intervention,  82.  Roman  view 
of  a  future  life,  91 ;  notes,  422-424. 
Human  sacrifices,  108 ;  note,  440.  The 
Roman  religfion  a  mode  of  seeking  public 
order,  in.  Without  principles  or  morals, 
267.  Music,  116;  Hawkins  quoted, 
445.  Roman  law  and  modem  juridical 
doctrine  and  life,  135,  136.  Childhood 
in  Rome,  138-140 ;  notes,  459-461.  Im- 
provement under  the  influence  of  Chris- 
tianity, 142 ;  notes,  463-465.  Woman, 
149,  150 ;  jiotes,  470-472.  Slavery,  155  ; 
notes,  478  ;  complete  subjection  of  slaves, 
159 ;  notes,  485-488  ;  improved  condi- 
tion under  Christianity,  161-163 ;  notes, 
488-492.  Usages  of  war,  175  ;  notes,  498. 
499.  Their  mle  of  war,  their  Jus  Civile 
and  Jus  Gentium,  181 ;  notes,  Cicero, 
Gains,  503.  Invasion  of  the  Empire,  182, 
183 ;  notes,  Sismondi,  Ammianus,  503, 
504.  The  Roman  Caesars  and  the  wor- 
ship in  Rome  characterized  by  Gibbon, 
50S ;  reference  to,  1S8.  No  sacred  books, 
affirmative  hterature  or  instruction,  218, 
219;  notes,  534,  535.  No  middle  class, 
224 ;  Mommsen  quoted,  537.  Disdain 
of  the  humbler  industries,  Cicero  quoted, 
538.  Education,  241 ;  Plutarch  quoted, 
561.  Moral  life  in  Rome  when  Chris- 
tianity appeared,  252-263 ;  notes,  56^ 
582.  Hostility  to  Jews  and  Christians, 
264,  265  ;  notes,  583,  584.  No  systematic 
benevolence,  272;  Tacitus  and  Seneca 
quoted,  588.  Persecutions  of  the  Chris- 
tians, 275-277 ;  notes,  593-595.  No 
confident  hope  for  the  future,  291-296; 
notes,  602-606.  Fall  of  the  Empire,  304, 
305.  Verses  on  the  fall  of  pagan  Rome, 
by  Mrs.  Alexander,  614,  615.  La  Mennais, 
Voltaire,  and  Pascal  on  the  triumph  ol 
Christianity,  615,  616. 

Romulus,  252,  567,  394. 

Rossi,  (Northcote  and  Brownlow),  «♦  Roma 
Sotterranea "  quoted,  271,  427,  550,  587, 
591,  612. 

ROUG^  quoted  on  Polytheism  in  Egypt,  390. 

Rousseau  on  Jesus  Christ,  376.  Plan  for 
perpetual  peace,  526.  On  the  Bible,  539, 
540.     On  Uje  triumph  of  Christianity,  616. 

Rowe  on  evidence  in  religious  matters, 
380. 

Rule,  The  Golden,  and  other  precepts  and 
maxims  common  to  Christianity  and  t4 
ethnic  religions.    See  Maxims. 

Rules  of  War  by  Dr.  Lieber  quoted,  521 
referred  to,  204. 

Ruskin  on  the  architecture  of  St.  Mark'^ 
553.  554- 


668 


INDEX. 


Russia,  193,  203,  206,  512,  514, 520,  523. 
Ruth,  book  of,  Goethe  on,  235. 
RUTILUS,  486. 

Sabbath,  347,  489,608.  Witches'  Sabbath, 

296. 
Sabina,  153,  574. 

Sacred  Books  of  the  World  ;  the  contrast 
of  the  Bible  and  ethnic  scriptures,  242- 
245  ;  notes,  564-566.  Account  of,  217- 
223;  notes,  528-540.  The  Rig- Veda 
quoted,  414.  Hebrew  and  Christian 
Scriptures,  see  Bible,  Gospels. 

China,  sacred  books  of,  217,  244  ; 
Tiele  quoted,  531.  Chinese  classics,  see 
China. 

India,  217,  242,  243 ;  notes,  Whitney, 
Tiele,  MfiUer,  Barth,  528-530  ;  Duncker, 
437;  Miiiler,  414.  See  Vedas,  Brah- 
MANic  system,  and  Buddhism.  Laws 
of  Menu,  Duncker  quoted,  415,  416; 
quoted  on  children,  462,  463 ;  reference 
to,  141 ;  on  women,  469 ;  reference  to, 
148. 

Egypt,  217  ;  The  Book  0/  the  Dead, 
Renouf  quoted,  531,  532,    See  Egypt. 

Mohammedan,  218;  the  Koran  or 
Qurdn,  Sell  quoted,  533.  Koran  concep- 
tion of  God,  51,  52.  Quoted,  508  ;  refer- 
ence to,  186.  On  translations  of  it,  239 ; 
note  on  the  translation  by  Peter  the  Ven- 
erable, 559.    See  Mohammedanism. 

Parsees,  or  Parsis  ;  of  Persia  and  India, 
218  ;  notes,  Duncker,  Haug,  Miiiler,  532, 
533;  Muller,  Haug,  364,  365.  The 
Avesta  quoted,  80,  414.  See  Parsees, 
Persia. 

Thibet,  217  ;  vote,  on  the  Kanjur  and 
Tanjur,  by  Muller,  530. 

Sibylline  Books  of  the  Romans,  218  ; 
notes,  Pliny,  Livy,  Niebuhr,  Grote,  534 ; 
reference  to,  293.  Prophetical  books,  293 ; 
Suetonius  quoted,  603.  See  Oracles, 
Philostratus. 
Sacredness  of  inter-state  duties,  inculcated 

by  Christianity,  206. 
Sacrifice,  idea  of ;  common  to  nearly  all 
religions,  105,   106.     Expiatory  meaning 
of  ethnic   offering,    107,    108 ;  Dollinger 
quoted,  436.     Ethnic  sacrifices  of  treasure 
and  of  animals  ;  and  human  sacrifices, 
108  ;  notes,  436-440.    Hebrew  peace-of- 
fering,  107 ;   the  law  of  sacrifice  of  the 
Hebrews,  108,  109.      Christian  doctrine 
of  sacrifice,  109-T14;    notes,   Taylor  on 
Propitiation  for  sin,  442  ;  Eucharistic  idea, 
no ;  Canon  of  Trent  quoted,  442.     Self- 
sacrifice,  notes,  Minucius  Felix,  Bunsen, 
Jameson,     Parkman,     443,     444.      See 
Christ. 
Sadi,  maxim  on  good  for  evil,  629. 
Sadocus,  500. 
Sagas,  68. 


Saint  Hilaire  on  Buddha,  627. 

St.  Kilda,  527. 

St.  Mark's,  architecture  of,  description  l^ 

Ruskin,  553. 
St.    Petersburg,    convention    at,    205 

Burke  quoted,  523. 
Saint  Pierre,  his  "  Projet  de  Paix  pert 

petuelle,"  206,  525. 
St.  Sebastian,  206. 
Sakoontala,  Williams  and  Goethe  quoted^ 

565. 
Salian  Franks,  their  law  respecting  stran" 

gers,  516. 
Sallust  quoted,  573 ;  reference  to,  549. 
Samians  brand  their  prisoners  with    the 

figure  of  an  owl,  484  ;  Aristophanes'  al- 
lusion, 485. 

Samuel,  his  prophetic  gift,  Ewald  quoted, 

542,  543- 
Samnites,  Livy  quoted,  499  ;  reference  to, 

175. 
Sanctus,  martyrdom  of,  Eusebius  quoted, 

595. 
Sandace,  sister  of  Xerxes,  439. 
Sanitary  and  Christian  Commissions  of 

the  U,  S.  Civil  war,  204. 
San  Zenone,  Veronese  church  of,  233. 
Sappho,  444. 
Saracen  ♦' universities";  Hallam  quoted, 

563.     Sack  of  Rome,  504,  505. 
Saragossa,  asylum  at,  497. 
Sassanian  epoch,  and  Sosiosh,  600  ;  refer- 
ence to,  291.    See  Parsees. 
Saturnian  reign,  Virgil  quoted,  600. 
SatyabhAmA,  wife  of  Krishna,  628. 
Savigny,    "Private    International    Law" 

quoted,  193,  380,  501,  517,  518,  526,  621. 

Savoy,  Duke  of,  persecutions  of  the  Wat 
denses,  512. 

Scaevola,  578. 

Scantia,  602. 

SCAURUS,  482. 

Scepticism  uniformly  pessimistic,  315. 
See  Pessimism. 

ScHAFF  :  his  "  Germany,  its  Universities, 
etc."  quoted,  238.  "  History  of  the  Chris- 
tian Church,"  416.  "Christ  in  Song," 
450.     "Creeds  of  Christendom,"  451. 

Schiller,  "  Thirty  Years'  War"  quoted, 
523,  524.    On  poetry,  554. 

SCHLEIERMACHER  quoted,  23,  373,  433. 

School  of  the  cloister ;   Notre  Dame  de 

Paris,  562. 
Schools  and  Colleges  under  Christianity, 

224,   241,    242 ;    notes.    Brace,    GuizoV 

Remusat,  561,  562. 
Schwegler  on  the  fourth  Gospel,  361. 


INDEX. 


669 


bCiENCE  and  Christianity,  231.     Secularist 

view  of   Providence  and  science;    Hol- 

yoake  quoted,  70,  409. 
SciPio,  633, 
Scriptorium,  mediaeval :  later  monks  of ; 

their  preservation  of  good  literature,  232  ; 

Lactantius  quoted,  548. 
Scriptures,  Christian.    See  Bible. 
Scutari,  hospital  at,  204. 
Scythians,  183,  434,  503. 
Sedan,  175. 
Self,  in  Buddhism,  Bigandet  quoted,  564. 

Self-sacrifice,  in  Christianity,  167,  322 ; 

nofes^  496. 

Sell  :  "  Faith  of  Islam  "  quoted  on  the 
Qurin,  533. 

Seleucia,  205 ;    Gibbon  on  the  sack  of, 

by  the  Romans,  523. 
Semitic  nations,  47,  237. 
Semple,  his  translation  ol  Kant's  "  Meta- 

physic  of  Ethics  "  quoted,  421. 

-Seneca,  on  the  Gods,  38,  39,  40 ;  notes,  381, 
384,  386.  Pantheistic  view  of  God,  40  ; 
quoted,  387.  Ridicules  the  deification  of 
Claudius,  43;  Merivale  quoted,  395.  His 
previous  eulogy  of  Claudius,  395.  On 
Fate,  417.  On  a  future  life,  91 ;  quoted, 
423.  On  children,  140  ;  quoted,  461,  462. 
On  women,  150  ;  quoted,  471.  On  slaves 
or  servants,  155  ;  quoted,  477,  478,  481, 
482,  486,  159.  Quoted  by  TertuUian, 
547.  Relations  between  him  and  St. 
Paul ;  Fleury  and  Troplong  quoted,  547, 
548 ;  reference  to,  232.  Quoted  by  the 
Fathers,  253,  568.  On  gluttony  and 
immorality,  254,  255  ;  quoted,  569,  570, 
Slh  573-  On  the  arena,  261 ;  quoted, 
580 ;  note  by  Macaulay,  581.  His  stoical 
view  of  pity,  272  ;  quoted,  588,  589.  On 
the  destrifction  of  the  world,  609.  Maxims 
by  him  similar  to  those  of  Christianity, 
131,  332;  quoted,  626.  The  question 
of  his  Jewish  origin,  346  ;  Lightfoot  and 
Augustine  quoted,  635.  Incidental  ref- 
erences, 41,  86,  98,  160,  166,  251,  263, 
353,  440,  479,  492,  559,  572. 

Sermon  on  the  Mount,  a  central  factor  in 
Christianity,  86,  87.  Its  relation  toward 
the  Decalogue,  266.  References  to,  160, 
165,  186,  283,  326.   See  Maxims. 

Servitude,  74;  Aristotle  quoted,  411. 
The  name,  servus,  156 ;  Augustine  quo- 
ted, 479.     See  Slavery. 

Servius,  423. 

Severus,  places  statues  of  Christ,  and 
others,  in  his  domestic  chapel,  274,  592. 
Institutes  instruction  on  auguries,  606. 

Seward  quoted,  and  note  on,  500,  501. 
Reference  to  the  matter,  177. 

Shaftesbury,  566. 

SllAIRP,  556. 


Shakespeare,  223,  556. 

Sibylline  books,  218;  notes^  534, 603.  Ret 

erences  to,  293,  544,  602. 
SlDONIUS,  552. 

Simon  Magus,  396. 
Simonidean  clergy,  587. 

Simonid^s,  473. 

Sin,  its  nature,  95.  The  human  constitu. 
tion  and  sin,  and  the  instinct  of  sacrifice, 
no.  Taylor  on  Propitiation  for  sin,  442. 
See  Sacrifice.  Christian  law  of  purity, 
266.  Taylor  on  Christ,  as  the  founder  of 
a  system  of  mundane  ethics,  585.  The 
ancient  Roman  religion  without  doctrinal 
principles,  or  a  code  of  morals,  267.  Its 
resistance  to  the  Law,  279.  Necessity 
of  righteousness,  326.  Maxims  on  sin 
common  to  Christianity  and  to  ethnic  re- 
ligions, 331,  332;  Seneca  and  Buddha 
quoted,  626.  Buddha's  wish  to  assume 
the  sin  of  the  world,  332.  Cicero  on  sin, 
253  ;  quoted,  568. 

Sismondi:  "Hist,  des  Fran^ais"  quoted, 
503. 

SiXTUs  v.,  495. 

Slavery,  universality  of,  when  Christian- 
ity appeared,  154  ;  humane  treatment  in- 
culcated by  Seneca  and  Aristotle,  155  ; 
quoted,  478,  Slavery  in  Greece  and  Rome, 
155-159 ;  notes,  479-487.  The  forces  of 
Christianity  before  which  slavery  fell,  160. 
Incipient  movements  toward  reform,  i6t  ; 
Troplong  and  Gains  quoted,  488.  The 
fall  of  slavery  under  Christianity,  161- 
163 ;  notes,  489-493.  Literary  employ- 
ments largely  left  to  slaves  in  Rome,  241. 
Defence  of  slavery  by  Aristotle,  74; 
quoted,  411.  Free-bom  children,  142; 
Trajan  and  Pliny  quoted,  463.  Corrupt- 
ing effect  on  conjugal  morality  of  slavery 
at  Rome,   Friedlaender  quoted,  474,  475. 

Smith,  "  Mediaeval  Missions  "  quoted,  617, 
619. 

Society,  ultimate  Christian,  169;  Cole- 
ridge quoted  on  the  difficult  progress  of 
Christian  society,  497. 

Socrates  on  the  gods,  Xenophon  quoted, 
385,  404.  The  most  grateful  service  to 
the  Deity,  55  ;  Xenophon  quoted,  402. 
The  daimon  within  of  the  Platonic  Soc- 
rates, 58;  Plato  quoted,  and  note  by 
DoUinger,  405,  406.  Waiting  for  a  Divina 
teacher,  60  ;  Plato  quoted,  406.    Precepts, 

420.  The  future  life,  91 ;  Plato  quoted, 

421.  Account  of  Socrates  by  Zeller,  560, 
References,  57,  68,  335,  345,  353, 376,  4C1, 
462,  542,  547,  568. 

Socrates,  "  Eccl.    History  "  quoted,  445, 

447.  616. 
Soldiers,  miUtary  service,  and  Christian 

ity,   201  ;   notes ^  Augustine,  Tertullian, 

Martineau,  518,  519. 
Solomon,  Song  of,  550. 


670 


INDEX, 


Solon,  214,  422,  468. 
SoMA-RiTUAL,  Whitney  quoted,  411. 

SOCrHSAYERS,  295. 
SOFHIA,  141. 

Sophocles,  55  ;  on  pride,  403.  Nemesis, 
288,  598.  The  little  value  of  life,  431. 
References,  473,  527. 

SOPHRONISCUS,  376. 
SOPHRONIUS,  119. 

SosiosH,  600.    See  Parsees. 

SosiTHEUS,  slave  of  Cicero ;  his  death, 
Cicero  quoted,  478. 

Soto,  509, 

Soul  of  man  ;  the  future  life  promised, 
under  conditions,  by  Christianity,  93,  94, 
321 ;  notes,  Stanley,  Taylor,  429,  430. 
Its  undestroyed  sensibility  to  what  is 
Divine,  the  primary  postulate,  334.  Soc- 
rates on  the  soul,  91,  421.  Plato,  91, 
345,  421,  422.  Other  Greek  and  Roman 
writers,  91 ;  notes,  422-426.  Modem  in- 
fidel view,  426.  Brahmanic  view,  75 ; 
Duncker  quoted,  412.  Buddhist  view, 
92;  notes  on  Nirviwa,  428.  Transmi- 
gration of  souls,  289 ;  notes,  Whitney, 
Herodotus,  DoUinger,  599,  600.  Budd- 
ha's earlier  existences,  70  ;  Duncker,  409, 
Physiological  ai?d  pessimistic  views,  99 ; 
notes,  433,  433. 

Sparta,  treatment  of  heralds,  176  ;  Her- 
odotus quoted,  500. 

Spartacus,  293,  593. 

Speculation  and  consciousness,  68. 

Spencer  quoted,  72,  494. 

Spinoza,  211. 

Spirit  of  God,  offered  to  man,  58.  ♦*  The 
fruits  of  the  Spirit,"  271. 

Stael,  Mme.  de,  "  De  la  Litt^rature  "  quot- 
ed, 370.    "  Rev.  Fran 9aise,"  494. 

Stanley,  Dean,  quoted,  120,  373,  374, 429, 
465,  542,  567. 

State,  the,  sacredness  of,  as  a  Divine  in- 
stitute, 187,  190;  notes,  Gibbon,  Mon- 
taigne, 508.  Isolation  of  ancient  states, 
199,  286 ;  Plato  quoted,  518.  The  Greek 
states,  180  ;  notes  on  tiie  Amphictyonic 
assembly,  502.  Plans  of  Charlemagne 
and  Napoleon,  207.  Doctrine  of  Chris- 
tian stales  in  regard  to  war,  204  ;  notes, 
521.  Sovereignty  of  states  and  the  lim- 
itations, 193  ;  notes  511,  512.  Relation 
of  states  to  ejch  other  under  Christianity, 
322,  323.    See  International  Law. 

Statius,  258. 

Stewart,  556. 

Stoics,  and  the  Stoical  philosophy :  con- 
ception of  God,  40,  41  ;  notes,  Seneca, 
Plato,  Strabo,  and  comment  by  Origen, 
387-389.  344;  Ueberweg  quoted,  633, 
634.  On  the  destruction  of  the  world, 
302  ;  notesy  609.    Effect  of  the  philoso- 


phy on  the  treatment  cf  children,  142; 
Trajan  and  Pliny  quoted,  463.  The  Pe« 
tronian  law,  488 ;  reference  to,  161. 
Justin  Martyr  on  the  Stoics,  544.  The 
stoical  view  of  Life,  99  ;  notes^  431.  On 
pity,  Seneca  quoted,  588, 

Strabo  on  ancient  usages  of  worship,  38 ;. 
quoted,  382,  His  stoical  view  of  God, 
41 ;  quoted,  389.  On  the  Cilician  slave 
trade,  479.  On  the  oracle  of  Ammon,. 
602  ;  reference,  293.  In  regard  to  MarcuS' 
Cato  and  his  wife,  256,  571. 

Strangers,  foreigners  and  exiles ;  their 
treatment  in  ancient  and  modem  times, 
196-198  ;  notes,  515-517. 

Strassburg  cathedral,  153. 

Strauss  quoted,  361,  365,  433,  607.  Ref- 
erence, 268,  625. 

Suarez,  his  "  Tractatus  de  legibus  ac  Dec 
legislatore  "  referred  to,  Hallam  quoted^ 
509. 

Suetonius  on  slavery,  478,  479,  482,  485,. 
488  ;  reference  to,  159.  On  Nero  and 
the  Christians,  261 ;  quoted,  581.  On 
Augustus,  394,  460,  567  ;  reierence,  252. 
On  Tiberius,  386.  The  Circus  and  Sta- 
dium, 476.  On  Christianity,  348,  586. 
On  priests  and  vestal  virgins,  603.  On 
the  Sibylline  books,  603.  On  portents, 
294,  Reference  by  Lecky  to  Suetonius, 
262.  Incidental  references,  251,  258,  259, 
262,  296,  396,  440,  588. 

Sully,  Memoirs  of,  quoted,  525, 

Sully,  Maurice  de,  and  Notre  Dame  de 
Paris,  562. 

SuLPicius.  423,  534. 

Sun  worship  at  Emesa,  Gibbon  quoted, 
396. 

Sunday,  worship  on,  by  Christians,  Justin^ 
Martyr  quoted,  435. 

SuNEiDESis,  meaning  of,  252.  See  Con- 
science. 

Supernatural  element  in  the  Scriptures, 
227,  228. 

Symonds,  "Studies  of  Greek  Poets" 
quoted,  369,  425,  587,  588,  598. 

Synoptists,  222. 


Tacitus,  on  the  deification  of  Nero's  daugh- 
ter, 395.  On  the  extinguishment  of  com- 
mon souls  by  death,  74  ;  quoted,  411.  His 
reference,  to  the  Christian  worship,  with 
the  comment  of  Tertullian,  435.  On  im- 
proper care  of  infants,  460.  On  the 
chastity  of  the  German  women,  475  ;  ref- 
erence, 151.  On  slaves,  486.  Slaughter 
of  captives  in  war  by  Germanicus,. 
499.  No  prisoners  taken  in  civil  wars, 
522.  Gluttony  of  Vitellius.  569.  On  the 
licentiousness  of  his  time,  572,  573.  Perse^ 
cutions  of  Christians,  578.  Rome  without* 
virtue,  262  ;  quoted,  582.     References  bj. 


INDEX. 


671 


him    to   Cnristians,    265,    34S,  586.     On 

Poniponia  Graicina,  591.     On  priests  and 

vestal  virgins,  602,  603.      On  the  Empire 

after  Augustus,  604,  605. 
Talmud  quoted,  466.     References  to,  27, 

278,  569- 
Taou  and  Taouism,  364.     See  China. 
Targums,  339.     Targum  of  Onkelos,  639. 
Tarquin  and  the  Sibylline  books,  218,  534. 
Tarsus,  Schools  of,  216. 
Tasso,  536,  598, 
Tatian  quoted,  374,  441,  458. 
Tauler,  text  quoted  by,  311. 
Taygetus,    Mt.,    feeble    infants    exposed 

there,  140 ;  Plutarch  quoted,  461. 
Taylor  :  "  Restoration  of  Belief  "  quoted, 

371,  429,  430,  442,  585,  586. 

Taylor  :  "  Etruscan  Researches  "  quoted, 
427. 

Temples  :  The  Hebrew  temple,  123,  124  ; 
worship  in,  466.  Greek  and  Roman  tem- 
ples, 123  ;  notes^  Cicero,  454,  289 ;  D61- 
linger  on  the  use  made  of  them,  455. 
Temples  for  human  worship,  43 ;  notes, 
Coulanges,  Cicero,  393,  394.  Temples  of 
Isis  and  Serapis,  296.  Temples  of  Flora, 
384.     Egyptian  temples,  290. 

Tendency  to  human  worship,  72,  73. 
Homage  to  power,  natural  to  man,  73. 

Terence  quoted,  461,  572.  R^/erence  to, 
136,  257,  549. 

Terentia,  572. 

Terpander,  444,  445. 

Tertullian,  on  freedom  of  worship  and 
religious  liberty,  113,  305  ;  quoted,  614. 
The  Apostles'  creed,  120.  On  Plato,  232, 
547 ;  Seneca,  253.  The  Devil's  pomp, 
259;  quoted,  578.  "The  Christians  to 
the  lions,"  265, 584.  The  world  naturally 
Christian,  265,  585.  Christians  perse- 
cuted, 276;  quoted,  595.  "The  blood 
of  Christians  the  seed  of  the  harvest,"  277. 
"  De  Spectaculis"  quoted,  303,  575. 
Christianity  unconquerable,  304.  His 
Montanism,  301.  Vileness  of  the  Rom- 
ans, 385,  396,  572.  Tacitus,  the  opposite 
of  tacit,  in  telling  lies,  435.  Reference  to 
the  Palatine  graphite,  435.  Children 
sacrificed,  441.  On  singing,  447,  476. 
On  infant  baptism,  465.  On  modesty 
and  sobriety  in  women,  474.  Against 
feminine  luxury,  588.  On  military  ser- 
vice, 518 ;  quotes  first  epistle  of  Peter, 
528. 

Testament.  See  Bible,  Gospel,  Scrip- 
tures. 

Teucer,  441. 

Thales,  628. 

Thargelia,  human  expiatory  sacrifices 
there,  439. 

Theatre,  Tertullian  and  Mommsen  quo- 
ted, 575,  576.     Reference,  257. 


Themistocles,  his  human  sacrificesj  439 

References,  108,  200, 
Theodore,  Christian  scholar  and  teacher,. 

in  the  seventh  century,  558. 
Theodore  the  Studite,  491. 
Theodoret,    535.       His    "  EcclesiasticaV 

History  "  quoted,  549. 

Theodosius,  98,  162. 

Theodosius  Junior,  447. 

Theodulph,  618. 

Theopampus  quoted,  382. 

Theophanies,  miracles ;  idioms  of  Divina 
utterance,  354. 

Theophrastus,  one  of  his  books  called 

"  Golden  "  by  Jerome,  568. 
Theresa,  631. 
Theudas,  630,  639. 

Thibetan  canon,  217 ;  MuUer  quoted,  530, 
Thomas  Aquinas,  119. 
Thomas  of  Celano,  119. 

Thomson,  J.  C,  Translation  of  the  Bha- 
gavad-Gitd  quoted,  628. 

Thomson,  W.,  Bampton  lectures  quoted, 

268. 

Thornton,  "History  of  China"  quoted, 
418,  419. 

Thorw^ald,  306. 

Thought  disguised  by  words,  Voltaire 
quoted,  514. 

Thrace,  treatment  there  of  the  Lacedae- 
monian ambassadors,  177;  Thucydides 
quoted,  500. 

Thrasea,  of  the  "  party  of  virtue,"  253. 

Thucydides  :  on  the  future  life,  91.  Sla- 
very and  helots,  157,  480,  484.  On  the 
Athenians,  410.  On  woman's  excellence, 
468.  On  the  slaughter  of  prisoners  oi 
war,  498,  499.  Treatment  of  ambassa- 
dors, 500. 

Thugs  in  India,  438. 

Tiberius,  3,  39,  73, 187,  295,  316,319, 386, 
441,  588,  602,  605. 

TiELE,  "History  of  Religions"  quoted, 
364,  454,  529,  S3I. 

Tilly,  523. 

Timotheus,  572. 

Tindal,  566. 

Titus,  157,  259,  298,  576,  606. 

Titus  Flavius  Clemens,  591. 

Tobias,  Bishop  of  Rochester,  558. 

Tombs  and  epitaphs.  Etruscan  cities  of 
the  dead,  Taylor  quoted,  427.  See  Nortb- 
cote's  Rossi  :  "  Roma  Sotterranea." 

Trajan  :  the  younger  Pliny's  report  to  him 
on  the  progress  of  Christianity,  104.  Hi» 
action  in  regard  to  free-bom,  deserted 
children,  142  ;  quoted,  463.     His  festivals 


^72 


INDEX. 


and    gladiatorial    exhibitions,   258,   576. 
References,  200,  265,  303,  492, 

Transmigration  of  souls,  the  Hindu  con- 
ception of,  common  to  both  its  great 
religions,  289;  Whitney  quoted,  599. 
Buddha's  earlier  existences,  Duncker  quo- 
ted, 409  ;  reference  to,  70.  Egyptians 
supposed,  by  some,  to  have  originated 
the  doctrine,  290 ;  Herodotus  and  Dol- 
linger  quoted,  599,  600.  Pliny's  con- 
temptuous reference,  424.     See  Soul. 

Treaties  between  nations  in  Christendom, 
and -among  civilized  states  of  antiquity, 
194-196;  notes,  512,  513.  Reference, 
323- 

Trench  :  "Sacred  Latin  Poetry"  quoted, 
451,  458. 

Tribonian,  23S. 

Trinity  in  the  Divine  Being,  48. 

Trophonius,  cave  of,  and  Oracle,  127 ; 
Pausanius,  and  Mahaffy,  quoted,  456. 

Troplong  :  "  De  I'lnlluence  du  Christian- 
isme  "  quoted,  262,  474,  488,  547,  571. 

Truce  of  God,  202.  "God's  peace," 
God's  truce,  Guizot  quoted,  506. 

Truth,  moral ;  condition  of  its  accept- 
ance, 18,  19 ;  notes,  Martineau,  Pascal, 
369.  Plato  quoted,  345  ;  Heraclitus  quo- 
ted, 388.  Parker  and  Martineau  quoted, 
638.  Credibility  of  evidence  in  religious 
matters,  28-32  ;  notes,  378-380. 

Tryers  to  decide  whether  infants  should 
be  reared  or  destroyed  ;  Plutarch  quoted, 
461. 

TSZE-KUNG,  419. 
TULLIA,  423. 

Turanian  creed,  Taylor  quoted,  427. 
Turner:  "Hist,  of  Anglo-Saxons "  quo- 
ted, 618. 
Tyndall,  280. 
Tyndareus,  394. 
Tyrwhitt  :  "  Christian  Art "  quoted,  551. 

Ueberweg  :  "  History  of  Philosophy  " 
quoted,  634. 

Uhlhorn:  "Conflict  of  Christianity  with 
Heathenism  "  quoted,  39,  262,  296,  392, 
583,  606. 

Ulpian,  quoted,  238,  405,  470. 

Unconscious  prophecies,  335  ;  Jones  quo- 
ted, 628,  629.  See  Fore-gleams,  Max- 
ims. 

Universities,  Paris,  Oxford,  and  Cam- 
bridge, 242 ;  notes,  Remusat,  Ingulphus, 
562,  563.  Saracen  universities,  Hallam 
quoted,  563.  University  at  Rome,  Meri- 
vale  quoted,  563.     References,  233,  329. 

Upanishads.  See  Sacred  Books,  India, 
Veda. 

Urban  IV.,  495. 

Urgulanilla,  138  ;  Suetonius  quoted,  459. 


Valens,  504,  606. 

Valentinian,  448,  504,  605. 

Valentinus,  361. 

Valerian,  304. 

Valerius  Maximus,  576. 

Varius  Geminius,  568. 

Varro  on  religion,  40,  386;  enumerate! 
foreign  deUcacies,  569. 

Vattel,  "  Law  of  Nations"  quoted,  511. 

Vaughan,  "Hours  with  the  Mystics" 
quoted,  27. 

Vedas,  The,  217 ;  notes,  528-530.  Sacri- 
ficial ritual,  437,  438,  439 ;  reference  to, 
108.  Authorship  of,  Miiller  and  Barth 
quoted,  362, 363.  The  various  books,  242. 
Monotheism  and  Polytheism  of,  Miiller 
quoted,  390.  Pantheism  of,  47  ;  Davids 
and  Duncker  quoted,  398.  Quotations 
from,  80,  414.  Soma,  in  Vedic  hymns, 
Whitney  quoted,  410.  See  Brahmanic 
system,  Buddhism,  Sacred  Books, 
India. 

Vedius  PoUio,  159  ;  Seneca  quoted,  486. 

Velleius,  393. 

Velletri,  394. 

Venice,  description,  by  Ruskin,  of  the 
Cathedral  of  Saint  Mark's,  553. 

Venus,  382,  383,  385,  392. 

Verres,  487. 

Vespasian,  44,  396,  576. 

Vesta,  405. 

Vestal  Virgins,  292,  293  ;  notes,  Suetonius, 
Tacitus,  &2.  References  to,  470,  471, 
473- 

Via  Dolorosa,  152. 

Vice  ;  homage  to  virtue,  Rochefoucauld 
quoted,  195. 

Victor,  577. 

Victories,  spiritual;  over  minds  and 
hearts  set  in  resistance  to  Christianity, 
329  ;  note  on  Norbert,  625. 

Villemain  :  "  Life  of  Gregory  VII." 
quoted,  310,  431. 

ViLLENAGE,  492. 

Vincent  de  Paul,  631. 

Virgil;  prophecies  in  the  PoUio  of  his 
fourth  eclogue,  316 ;  note  on,  by  Neale, 
and  reference  to  the  supposed  visit  of  St. 
Paul  to  his  tomb,  624.  The  fourth  ec« 
logue  quoted,  600 ;  reference  to,  291. 
The  Georgics  quoted,  393.  ^neid,  397. 
Incidental  references,  232,  294,  549,  559. 

Virgin,  The  ;  references  to,  151,  152,  234, 

550,  551- 
Virtue  the  health  of  the  soul,  Plutarch 
quoted,  254.  The  deified  virtues  of  the 
early  Romans,  42.  Virtues  of  domestic 
life,  271 ;  Euripides  quoted,  587.  See 
Precepts. 


INDEX. 


67a 


Vishnu,  332 ;  note^  637,  628.  References 
to,  47,  528. 

Visigoths,  305. 

VisTiLiA,  572. 

ViTELLius,  gluttony  of,  254;  Tacitus 
quoted,  569.     Reference  to,  580. 

VocoNiAN  Law,  149 ;  notesy  471. 

VOGT,  432. 

Voltaire  on  Alexander  III.,  and  efforts  for 
humane  objects,  167,  496.  Words  used 
to  conceal  thought,  196,  514.  On  the 
droit  d'AubainCy  515.  On  ihe  aaerainess 
of  a  God,  601. 

volumnius,  534. 

Von  Lasaulx,  440. 

Vulgate,  477,  560. 


Waldenses,  512. 

Wallon:  "Histoire  de  TEsclavage" 
quoted,  481,  576. 

War,  usages  of,  in  regard  to  combatants  in 
ancient  times,  174,  175,  176 ;  notes,  498, 
499.  In  Europe  in  1871,  175.  Ancient 
treatment  of  heralds  and  ambassadors, 
176,  177 ;  notes,  500.  In  America  in 
1861,  177 ;  Seward  quoted,  500,  501.  The 
Geneva  tribunal  of  1871-73,178  Chris- 
tianity and  war,  200-202  ;  nofe^  Augus- 
tine, Martineau,  Gentiiis,  Mackintosh, 
Milton,  Bluntschli,  Woolsey,  518-520. 
The  Law  of  Reprisals  and  Privateering, 
202,  203 ;  notes,  Woolsey,  Wheaton,  520, 

521.  The  only  justification  of  war, 
Bluntschli  and  Lieber  quoted,  521.  Cus- 
toms of  antiquity,  204  ;    Tacitus  quoted, 

522.  Ministries  of  relief  in  modern 
times,  Miss  Nightingale,  Sanitary  and 
Christian  Commissions,  204,  205 ;  the 
Geneva  and  other  conventions  in  the  in- 
terest of  humanity,  205  ;  notes,  522,  523. 
Slaughter  and  sack  of  cities  in  past  times. 
205,  206 ;    Gibbon    and  Schiller  quoted, 

523.  524,  Prisoners  of  war  reduced  to 
slavery  in  ancient  times,  156  ;  notes,  Livy, 
Cicero,  480.  Reference  to  war  in  modern 
times,  323. 

Ward  quoted,  206,  501,  514,  526. 

Westminster  Abbey,  141. 

Wh EATON :    ' •  International  Law  "  quoted, 

507,  509,  510,  5"i  512, -515,  521,  526. 
White,  448. 

White  Sea,  treaty  relating  to,  203,  520. 
Whitney  quoted,  405,  410,  529,  565,  599. 
Wilkes,  501, 

William  of  Champeaux,  24a,  562. 
William  of  Hirschau,  496. 
William  the  Conqueror,  310,  505,  516, 
Williams,  565. 
Wilson,  564. 


Wisdom  and  Christianity,  211,  aia ;  C«» 
sus  and  Origen  quoted,  527. 

Wise  ;  Origin  of  Christianity,  quoted,  63a, 

Wolfe,  30. 

Woman,  position  of,  under  the  Hebrews, 
146,  147 ;  notes,  466.  In  Greece,  147, 
148  ;  notes,  467,  468.  In  India  and  China, 
148,  149 ;  notes,  469.  The  Chinese  char- 
acter designating  women,  Rerausat 
cited  by  Schlegel,  149,  469.  The  Roman 
temper  and  rule  about  women,  149,  150  ; 
notes,  470-472.  Plato,  Grote,  vEschylus, 
and  Aristophanes  on  woman,  473.  Con- 
cubinage, 151 ;  notes,  474.  The  tribute 
of  Tacitus  to  the  chastity  of  the  German 
women,  475  ;  referred  to,  151.  The  im- 
proved position,  social  and  legal,  of  wom- 
an, under  Christianity,  151-154;  notes^ 
475-477.    See  Moral  life  of  Antiquity. 

Woolsey:  "  Introduction  to  International 
Law  quoted,  195,  198,  202,  507,  512,  513,. 
518,  520. 

Woolston,  566. 

Worcester,  200. 

Wordsworth  quoted,  139. 

World,  its  end  expected,  301,  302 ;  Au- 
gustine quoted,  608;  Dollingerand  Seneca, 
609.  In  the  Middle  Age,  309  ;  Michelet 
quoted,  620. 

World's  hope  of  progress ;  a  distinct  ap- 
prehension of  the  Christian  doctrine  of 
God  indispensable  to  any  conviction  of  a 
developed  unity  in  history,  285,  286.  Ab- 
sence in  the  religions  of  antiquity  of  such 
a  recognition  of  God  and  of  any  hope 
of  progress,  286-296 ;  notes,  598-606. 
The  Jews,  hope  for  the  future,  296- 
300 ;  notes,  Renan,  Strauss,  607.  The 
hope  of  progress  under  Christianity,  300- 
306 ;  notes,  608-616.  This  hope  the 
foundation  of  missionary  enterprise,  306- 
308;  notes,  617-619.  Its  transient  fail- 
ure at  the  close  of  the  tenth  century,  309- 
311;  Michelet  quoted,  620.  Since  the 
era  of  the  Reformation,  311-313;  notes, 
Bancroft,  Bradford,  621.  The  hope  for 
the  future  under  Christianity,  313-316; 
notes,  Savigny,  Lecky,  Parker,  Liddon, 
Arnold,  Neale,  621-624. 

Worship,  Christian,  322.  Its  seat  in  the 
conscience  and  affection,  Martineau  quo- 
ted, 369.  Immoral  and  debasing  rites  of 
worship  in  ancient  times,  37-39;  notes, 
381-386.  They  become  objects  of  ridi- 
cule, 42,  43 ;  notes,  391-393.  Idol  wor- 
ship, 46.  Worship  of  monsters,  399. 
Deification  of  human  beings,  43,  44; 
notes,  393-396.  Worship  of  power  ;  and 
of  the  forces  of  nature,  72  ;  note  on  plant 
worship,  by  Whitney,  410.  The  first 
teaching  of  Christianity  matched  with  the 
existing  tendency  to  human  worship,  73. 
See  Christianity,  Lecture  IV.,  Ethnic 
Religions,  and  the  various  ethnic  sy*- 
terns. 


674 


INDEX. 


Xenophanes,  47. 

Xenophon  on  the  Gods,  385,  402,  404«  On 
slaves,  483.  On  Cyrus,  498.  Refer- 
ences, 57,  157,  180,  224,  406. 

Xerxes,  394,  439.  50o,  503. 


Young,  education  of  the,  341 ;  notes^  561- 
563. 


Zeller quoted,  361.  "History of  Greek 
Philosophy,"  388,  40a  Plato,  398,  479. 
Socrates,  56a 


Zend-Avesta,  218.  Account  of,  by  Haug, 
364,  365.  MuUer  quoted,  533.  Refer- 
ence, 398.    See  Parsees,  Zoroaster. 

Zeno,  40,  252,  515. 

Zeus,  his  nature,  81 ;  Grote  quoted,  415. 
References  to,  331,  404,  598. 

ZiNZENDORF,  121. 

Zot  of  the  Gospels,  9a 

ZOPHYRUS,  560. 

Zoroaster,  218 ;  Mflller  and  Haug  qwr- 
ted,  364,  365.  His  care  for  animals,  436, 
References  to,  54a,  6oa     See  Parsem. 

ZoTiCHUS,  591. 


^m^^ 


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